A Growing Madness
by Trynia Merin
Summary: Complete. The Rani has captured the Last Mantissan, former slaves of the Time Lords, and used her to capture two specimins from earth, a telepath and normal geologist from the seventies... can Ace and the Doctor free them?
1. Default Chapter

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Part 1, Castaway in Time and Space

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Disclaimer: Callom and Dr. MacLaren are my characters. This is fanfiction, and I don't own Dr. Who, which is part of the BBC's collection of great SF. This is the Seventh Doctor and Ace, and takes place before she leaves, and before the Curse of Fenric¼ 

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Rescued

He could hardly believe his luck. By some miracle fate had dumped him into the laps of these two Time Travelers. Sure, they both looked strange, with their odd outfits, but considering they probably had visited multiple times, their outfits were not all that bizarre.

Callom remembered waking up for the first time. Blinking open his eyes, he peered at a black haired man sitting beside the bed. Calmly the man sat there with crossed legs, leaning his elbow on his knee. His wise old turtle face scrunched into a pondering look, and wispy black hair suggested late middle age. Yet there was a childlike curiosity mixed into his features. 

What seemed the strangest to Callom was the brightness of the man's eyes. Such intensity he'd seen before in _her_ eyes. No mental traces penetrated a formidable wall around this stranger's mind. Clearly he wasn't human.

Fear overtook Callom. Cold sweat plastered his blond hair against his smooth forehead. _She _possessed no thoughts he could discern. The unearthly intensity of the room's lights coupled with an eerie pulsing in the very fabric of the room, flooding his perception. Immediately he struggled to escape. Another collector had captured him.

"Steady on, lad," urged the man.

"You'll niver put me in yuir zoo!" shouted Callom wildly.

"You're amongst friends here . . . "

A pair of hands gripped Callom's shoulders. Pinned him to the bed with surprising strength. "N-no! Must get away . . . " stammered Callom. "I'll Na' be butchered by the likes of ye . . . "

"Professor, what's going on?" asked a soprano voice. Out of the corner of his eye, Callom noticed a teenaged girl also present in the room. "E's coming out of it."

"Sh. It's all right lad. No one can hurt you here . . . " soothed the strange man, gently grasping the sides of Callom's young face. Firmly he turned Callom's head and fixed his eyes into the young Scot's hazel ones.

"Don hypnotize me . . . I'll na' be controlled again . . . "

"Easy . . . trust me. You're too sick and delirious to go anywhere."

As Callom looked into the man's dark eyes, he sensed calm and concern. Something, the look in the girl's eyes, reassured him that he was truly safe. Her long brown hair flipped over her shoulder in a long ponytail.

"Where am I nau""

"Safe," repeated the black haired man. Those creases in his forehead looked comical and sad simultaneously.

"Looks like a ship or some kind of craft . . . " muttered Callom, glancing around quickly. "Can't be on a planet cause I feel that same strange vibration . . . like before""

"Where do you last recall being . . . where you last felt that vibration"" asked the man, pulling his question marked sweater down around his hips.

"It was a space ship . . . inside a small cabinet. There were so many rooms inside it. And there was a humming . . . like the drones on a piper's bag."

"And do you remember who was on board this ship""

"Animals. And aliens n the like," recounted Callom. His head ached from the effort of remembering. "N' there was . . . a woman wearing red. Had long hair and bright eyes. Kept taking blood outta everyone, and poked needles with syringes full some drug int me. And she kept cutting mah hair."

"Woman in red"" he asked. Elbow resting on his crossed knees, he propped his chin intently on his left hand.

"Aye. Wore a red wraparound smock like Doctor Frankenstein in th' movies. She . . . she put drugs in mah friend Raina MacLaren . . . and she screamed!"

"Who's Raina"" asked Ace, sitting on the end of Callom's bed. Immediately the man shushed her with a shake of his head.

"She's ma friend. She couldnae get away. Told me-- to save mahsel'-- couldnae help her,"

Callom choked as a tight band seemed to constrict his chest. Hot tears burned his cheeks. All he could do was sob when he remembered her lying on that slab of counter, helpless. Screaming to him to save himself.

An infinite sadness flashed across the man's lined face. He exchanged glances with the girl. Stern anger hardened her young cheeks as she frowned. "Bleeding' wench," she gritted.

Once again the man turned to Callom, pressing a paisley cloth into the lad's hand. "So do you remember anything else . . . anything at all that you might think it important to tell me""

Dabbing his eyes, Callom struggled with a word. "There was this name. The woman called hersel'. A French or Indian word that mean queen. Rani--or Randy--"

"Rani""

"Aye, that's it, lassie! Rani!" cried Callom.

"The Rani," repeated the man bitterly. Lowering his dark eyebrows, he rose from his stool. This time Callom felt pure anger radiating from him. Interestingly this was the first time he sensed anything at all from this stranger. He'd been able to discern some of the girl's thoughts. ** She** seemed human anyway.

"Again she vivisects innocent sentient beings to further her research . . . not concerned with the consequences of her acts," he grumbled with disgust, with his back turned to them.

"Did ah say something wrong, mister"" wondered Callom, scratching his head.

"Who the heck's the Rani, Professor""

"Only one of the most brilliant minds traveling the Cosmos," snorted the man, whirling about. "Second only to my own intellect, Ace."

Callom realized he was addressing the girl as "Ace." "Is this Rani person a Time Lord, Professor""

"Does an Ice Warrior come from Mars"" snorted the man. "Does a Dalek ask you politely if he can exterminate you""

"Ah take it ye ken her, sir," said Callom cautiously. For the first time he felt hope. "Then can ye help me save Raina""

"We can hope," sighed the Professor, or at least that's what Ace called him. He returned to his stool.

"Then hurry . . . we can still catch them . . . "

"You're in no condition to go anywhere now," snapped the Professor. "You need rest, fluids, and nourishment."

"But we may have nae more time . . . " protested Callom. Ace shook her head, intimating the young Scot to silence. She grinned.

"My dear lad, we have plenty of time. In fact we have all the time in the Universe."

"There he goes again," moaned Ace.

"Wait a moment. Maybe we don't have all that much time, on the other hand."

"What are you babbling about, Professor""

"Since the Rani has them on board her ship, we might have a problem, Ace. But mayhap I can buy us some more time."

"Dinna tell me you two can travel through Time as well," exclaimed Callom. "Tha's incredible."

"First thing, young man, it's Doctor, not Professor. Despite what Ace addresses me as. And second, you need to rest. So relax and leave the worry to me."

"Yeah, leave the time to the Time Lord," muttered Ace.

"Doctor, eh""

"Just Doctor."

As if forgetting something, the Doctor snapped his fingers. "How silly of me. What is your name, young man""

Straightening up, he said, "Callom Andrew McPherson. From 1979 somewhere near... Edinbourough in Scotland. If you ken Earth time. I hope."

"Does he know earth time," laughed Ace. "A good job, squirt. He's always landing there every other time."

"Thank you, miss _I'm from Perivale_," sighed the Doctor, hands on his hips.

Hours passed in the little room. Callom woke and slept between bowls of broth and cups of distilled water. He threw up once or twice, but slowly his stomach held food once more. Waking up from a deep sleep, he half expected to find himself once more in a perspex cage.

Turning over, he looked at the circles on the white walls. With effort he pushed himself to sit up, and swung his bare feet around to dangle just above the floor. Its flat smooth surface chilled his shaking feet as he stumbled across to the cabinet. One step, then another he took with growing strength.

To his surprise he spotted his clothing hanging in the wardrobe. The stains of blood and grime were absent from the freshly laundered kilt and shirt. Callom ran his fingers over the soft McPherson tartan, and prayed he'd find Raina. All the rips were neatly sewn together in the soft wool.

There was a trick to putting on a kilt. Callom wrapped the tartan around his waist, holding it in place with one hand as he slipped the leather strap on the right hip through the hole in the waistband. He fumbled with the leather straps and buckles with shaking fingers. Apparently his strength had not yet returned. He slipped off the oversized nightshirt and put on his own white button up, newly stiff with starch. Where did the Time Travelers do their laundry"

Bending over, he fastened the ornamental pins at the bottom corner of the kilt's opening. A ceremonial clansmen pin instead of the traditional oversize safety pin was fastened against red and forest green squares. Callom wore the pins for confidence. Something to remind him of his clan heritage. But not too fancy beyond the kilt.

Just who were these time travelers anyway" Callom wondered this while he pulled on his green pullover sweater. It matched the green in his plaid. They claimed to be time travelers, like the Rani was. And the man didn't have a name, just a title.

At the bottom of the wardrobe sat his knapsack. He sorted through his belongings: two books, tissues, chewing gum, several socks and a turtleneck shirt. Then he carefully pulled out a leather-sheathed knife. Slowly he turned it over in his hands, examining the blade. He could glimpse his sparsely freckled face briefly in its surface. The highland dirk belonged to his grandfather when he was Callom's age. Once more he slid it into its sheath.

Automatically Callom strapped the sheath around his right ankle. It had chafed him at first to wear it there. He complained it rubbed against his calf. Now if he didn't feel the dirk there, he was uncomfortable. The _skeindu_ was a piece of family history to carry through his strange adventures.

Cautious, Callom exited the room. Those same indented circles lined the hallway. All over the walls they sat in a honeycomb pattern. As he walked, he felt his kilt swirling around his knees with each step. Step after step carried him down the humming corridors that seemed endless.

Ace had told him how to get to the Control Room. How large was this ship" It had a peculiar name, TARDIS. That's what the Doctor called it. Callom knew some science even though he was only eleven or twelve-year's old. He had Raina to thank for that.

Slowly Callom opened the door. That humming was strongest from behind it. In a moment he found out why. Right in the center of a large high vaulted chamber sat a control table. Its slanted surface flickered with multiple lights and buzzed with digital readouts and small CRT screens. Right in sync with the humming flashed a glass cylinder that rose and fell every few seconds. The Rain's ship had a similar console with a metal sculpture that spun instead of a column.

Sterile air filled his young lungs. The Doctor must have heard him approach, for Callom heard him say, "Hello," without even looking up.

"I'm feeling much better, sir," Callom reported.

Looking up from one of the six panels, the Doctor smiled. "Amazing what creature comforts can do, m'lad""

"Must be, cause I feel less like a creature, n more like a lad again."

Was that a Scots burr Callom heard in the Doctor's accent" He found himself slipping into a heavy Highland accent, as he tended to do when he was nervous or upset or excited. "Yes, thank ye sir, but do y' ken where Raina is nau""

"Let's jest say I'm working on it."

"Oh great, there 'e goes again," interrupted an English accented voice. Wearing a skirt shorter than Callom's kilt, Ace entered. Black spandex leggings rippled gracefully.

"Professor, when are you gonna give 'im the truth""

"Whadda y mean, lass"" asked Callom. 

"That phrase, 'I'm working on it,' means he's not discovered anything yet," explained Ace. "You'll learn that when you travel all around the 12 galaxies with him."

"Other than translating my every phrase, Ace, don't you have something more useful to do"" murmured the Doctor. "Like cooking up some Nitroglycerin or TNT""

"That's Nitro 9, Professor," Ace corrected. "For your info, it takes a couple hours to cook."

"Why you bother blowing things up instead of trying to understand them is beyond me," muttered the Doctor, rounding the panel to another control. 

Ace stuck out her tongue at him, and stood next to Callom. "I see you found the clothing store," she said. "Way cool kilt. Great colors. What plaid is it""

"It's the McPherson tartan."

"Can you wear other colors or just those""

"Sometimes I wear the Black Watch..."

"That's the one with the black and the green right""

"Aye. Ye know lots about it Ah see."

"I'm not up on the rules for plaids."

"I'm entitled to wear ma mother's clan, and ma own. And the Black watch. But that's it."

"What's that brill pin say""

"It's the clan saying... a kind of motto. It's in Gaelic. I kin translate it if ye like..."

"Callom, can you come over here a minute"" interrupted the Doctor. "I need your help."

Pulling down his sweater, Callom went over to the control console. "What's up" Any trace of Raina""

"I understand you're telepathic""

"Aye. There were others like me who was teaching me t use mah powers better when we left Earth. I dinna ken how strong I am, but they'd said I'm getting better wi' practice."

Ace winced. Callom sensed she couldn't understand his thick accent very well. Although she was trying hard. For a moment he sensed her thoughts. Confusion, and wariness. Thoughts of a small town in the middle of England. Nothing ever happened. People there spoke with thick Midlands drawl. 

"I'd like you to picture the last image in your mind."

"What good's that gonna do, Professor" It's not like he can give you coordinates or anything. He says he doesn't know where the 'eck the ship was..."

"Callom, stand over by that one panel. No, not that one. See the one with the two hand-sized panels" Good. Stand there. It won't bite you."

"Now put your hands on those panels. Gently. Close your eyes."

"Wha is this Doctor"" asked Callom, extending his hands cautiously.

"The TARDIS has a telepathic relay system. If you concentrate, the TARDIS should boost your thought discerning powers enough to sense Raina's thoughts."

"But mah powers to scry are nae strong enau," protested Callom. "It'd be like tryin to find a needle in a haystack."

"A shark can smell blood miles away in the sea," said the Doctor. "And you claim to have a mental bond with Raina. The TARDIS will expand your perception over Space and Time. In fact the Ranis telepathic circuits will work against her this time."

"But you said the TARDIS's have a force field shielding them," protested Ace. "I don't think she'd let anybody just listen in."

"We have to try. Now, put your hands lightly on those panels in front of you. Gently. Breathe in and out. Slowly. Feel your mind unfolding, like a parachute. Around you is a vast void. Full of many sounds. A cosmic fugue. You know what piece to play. Call out to it..."

Callom felt the immensity of Time and Space. His tiny voice cried out to fill a vast volume. But now the boost rose his treble pitch like an amplifier. In the space between his ears he heard little. A nothing.

*_Raina... please hear me._

Again he called. Nothing.

*_Raina... can ye hear me nau"_

He opened his eyes. "Och, I hear nothing! Not a single thought!"

"Perhaps you need to concentrate better. I want you to form a picture in your mind. Of Raina. Not just a physical appearance. Think of her mind. How it touches yours when you are near. Attune your mind to her pattern of thinking. Concentrate."

Ace jumped. Right in the room she saw a spectral image forming. By the console stood the young Scot, eyes squeezed shut as he thought hard. "Hey, Professor, what's happening""

"Shush Ace. I do believe he's able to influence our visual cortexes... that's an image of Raina..."

The spectral image grew stronger. It shaped its angles and lights into that of a humanoid, hovering in an indeterminate place. An image of a woman wearing glasses with white streaked hair and a weary face. She lay stretched out on a slab, struggling against her bonds.

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*_Raina, It's me, Callom!_

Weakly she came through... _*Callom! You're alive!_

***_Aye! That I am! I'm safe and well. I'm trying to find ye._**

*No... she'll hear you...

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*_I won't leave ye nau..._ Where are you going"

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*She said something about a planet... Tetrad... Tetrabyria...

The Doctor watched the spectral images with growing interest. He saw a clear image of hundreds of glass cages of varying size containing a multitude of creatures. On one wall were scribbled strange figures. Strange bat-like creatures hung from the ceiling of a room...

A TARDIS control room. Bending over it was an image of a woman, haughtily pressing controls. She laughed scornfully at the figure on the slab writhing in agony...

Suddenly the images stopped. Callom cried out, and writhed in agony. "Professor, what's happening to the kid""

"Some sort of mind lock... Callom! Break free, lad! Snap out of it..."

Ace moved toward him. "Stay away from him, Ace! His thoughts may stun your mind."

"You'll never take me... you unethical excuse for a scientist," gritted Callom, with a British accent. Clearly the pattern of speech was not his own. "Never... you're mad..."

The Doctor slid round the console toward Callom. Gripped the boy's shoulders. "Listen to me, boy! You are Callom McPherson! You're safe..."

Ace watched helplessly as the Doctor writhed, struggling to pull the young Scot away from the control panel. "Professor! Snap out of it!"

Callom screamed in his treble voice. Then fell backwards as the Doctor wrenched him from the TARDIS console. Gently the Doctor caught the boy in his arms. "Easy lad, I have you," he soothed, wiping his brow with a paisley handkerchief.

"Is he..." asked Ace, crouching next to the Doctor. He clutched Callom's limp body against his chest, and balanced the boy's head and shoulders on his bent knee. Covered with sweat, Callom's skin was pale and clammy to the touch.

"Get me some water, please Ace. The boy's under tremendous strain..."

"Why'd you let him do that"" demanded Ace angrily. "You might have killed him!"

"If we have any chance of stopping the Rani, we must take it."

"Even if it means sacrificing a kid to get it""

"Ace, just do as I say, that's a good girl..."

Snorting, she scrambled to her feet. Muttered to herself angrily as she exited. A few seconds later she returned, carrying a plastic cup. "Here's your water, Professor," she reported sullenly.

"Callom," he whispered. "Wake up..."

Callom's blond lashed eyelids flickered, and hazel eyes glanced up at the Doctor. "I saw her... I saw her..." he murmured.

"Easy... take a sip of this... all down... easy..." Gently, the Doctor touched the rim of the cup to the boy's lips. With the slightest drop passing into his mouth, Callom was able to take the cup from him. 

Ace hovered nearby. Callom sensed apprehension from her, as if the Doctor had just done something he shouldn't have. Exactly what it was he couldn't discern. Cool water slid down his parched throat, banishing the dryness.

Dry throated, she once against strained against resilient bands. They tightened the instant that she moved, cutting off the blood flow to her limbs. Tingling pain racked her, and she was forced to freeze until it stopped. Unable to move, yet unable to stand sitting still because of the stiffness from laying rigidly on her back.

Whoever had pinned her to this specimen table didn't want her to die. She was being kept alive, a dozen tubes sticking into her. So slowly the liquids drained in and out. She didn't eat solid food for the last few hours. Just some nutrient broth percolated into her body. All around her were other cages occupied by other life forms. They too had tubes running into them at various points on their bodies.

"How do I get into these messes"" she griped. 

"You humans should not have tried to exceed your grasp...."

"Traitor..." Raina MacLaren whispered. "I thought you would help us..."

"I did help you... didn't Callom escape"" whispered the voice slowly. Her head and shoulders came into view, her platinum streaks striating the coal black locks that curled around her face.

"But I remain," Ray whispered.

"You aided and abetted," said Raina. "And I was forced to return you here..."

"Lying bitch," Ray spat into her face.

"Ray, please... there was a good reason..."

The light in Vitreum's eyes flashed fear when someone's smooth voice interrupted them. "Really, you are a sentimental fool, Raina... fraternizing with lesser life forms..."

"Rani," whispered Raina, stepping back from the table where the subject was confined. She smoothed out her sash glittering with the pins of the high scientific counsel, and regarded her mistress.

"Have you made the necessary preparations"" the Rani asked.

"Yes, Rani," she nodded dully. 

"So, the angel of Death has returned to check the progress of her student"" Ray Mariner laughed ironically.

"This one has spirit, it actually talks," the Rani laughed, moving into view. Ray gritted her teeth as the Time Lady scientist grabbed her chin with viselike fingers and twisted Ray's head from side to side.

"Rani, I did what you asked..."

"And yet the human male escaped. You are getting sloppy, Vitreum..." Rani said, her dark eyes flashing with momentary anger. "I'm beginning to question your loyalty..."

"Rani, I have done what you asked..." said Vitreum, as the Rani advanced upon her. 

"Do you forget that you are my servant"" asked Rani. "that your entire scientific knowledge you owe to me""

"I do not forget, that you lured me into betraying my own people... centuries ago to the Time Lords... your superior race," Vitreum answered flatly. 

"You owe me your life," Rani raised a manicured fingernail. "You are the last of your misbegotten kind. And you should be glad I considered your species worth saving..."

"For that I thank you, Rani," Vitreum bowed her head. Was that defiance that Ray saw in the young scientist's silver eyes" For the first time since she convinced her to free them"

"You forget that you are an inch away from death," Rani said, holding up her microcomputer bracelet, posing her finger over the top button. 

"I know..." Vitreum nodded, hate gritting her teeth. She knew the biochemical agent that could be triggered in a nanosecond if the Rani even suspected she was about to consider betrayal.

"And this human female, of which you seem particularly fond, might well suffer the consequences of your folly..." said Rani, moving toward Ray once more. 

"No," Raina denied.

"It was your disease that wiped them out, wasn't it"" Raina spat. "The Mantissans! Vitreum, why do you let her push you around" She murdered your race with her experiments! Do you want to be any better then she""

"You amuse me, simian," Rani laughed, jerking Ray's head back by her strands of dark hair. "Humans are weak creatures. I had hoped to improve upon the young male specimen. But thanks to your folly Vitreum, he has escaped. I think I shall carry out my experiment upon this one... she has great constitution... but her chatter is idol psychobabble..."

"You think you're better then us because you're a Time Lord"" Ray asked, defiant to the end. "You're pathetic..."

"Look at it this way," said the Rani in her smooth, infuriating voice. "You will be participating in a great experiment. I thought you always wanted to contribute to the cause of Science."

"Not as the subject of the experiment!" she argued. "Rani, let her go! Return her to her native environment!" said Vitreum!

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you had FEELINGS for this lesser creature... as you did for the male humanoid spawn..."

"I cannot deny it," said Vitreum, moving between the Rani and Ray's table. "She is intelligent. What right have we to be experimenting on her kind""

"Superior intelligence, Vitreum," The Rani shook her head. "You had certain reservations about my techniques. Therefore I thought it was fitting that you cooperate in a less, as they say, compromising capacity. I have been tolerant till now. Must I subject YOU to examination""

"No..." Vitreum said. "Just... this once, can't you spare this one""

"All creatures are of use. It is a waste to destroy such an excellent specimen as this one. She will not die, but will be proud to be manipulated into a far superior species... that Homo Sapiens could have aspired to..." said the Rani eagerly.

"Vitreum, she almost destroyed Callom! How can you stand by and let her do this"" Ray demanded.

"Humans are excellent test material. Pity about the human spawn. He has such telepathic potential, but the human genes are inhibiting it. I merely borrowed from your inheritance to enhance his abilities. Improve on the course of evolution," Laughed the Rani, turning to Vitreum. "You cannot deny it, my student. What progress. I helped him. Why I bother explaining my reasons to this small minded simian is beyond me."

"Rani, why"" asked Vitreum, gathering her nerve from Ray's resolve. "Forgive me for asking why""

"You surprise me Vitreum. Haven't the Mantissans, your species done that for generations Used Genetic engineering to breed a superior race? With the data gained from this subject I could indeed make you the progenitor of a newer, better breed..."

"Yes, but if a culture did not wish to undergo the changes, they could choose not to. Evolution was a matter of choice."

"Ah, but some species do not know when they are well off. Your species has quite a good idea. But they, like many are too squeamish. As I see you are becoming... and that disappoints me, my student," Rani shook her head.

"You see what she promises"" Ray asked Vitreum. "She's amoral... with no remorse..."

"Do stop your squawking, ape," Rani laughed in Ray's face. "Why stop the inevitable, Vitreum" You have the capacity for great power. Power beyond mere telepathy. Why, if the Time Lords knew what you were capable of, they would not hesitate to wipe you off the map of the Universe."

"I don't understand," Vitreum said. "What has your experiments with these humans to do with my people" How can subjecting her to such modifications save my species""

"You soon will. All too soon."

Through the lab came the wheezing groan of Dematerialization. "Accept your situation, Mantissan. I am doing you a favor. Your species is just years from becoming one of the most spectacular in the Universe, when I am done here. You will be the mother of a new race..."

"Under your control"" Ray added.

"Pah, what limits you have to your views? Do you think I want mere power"" the Rani laughed again. "Vitreum, you know I seek the glory of discovery, as you do. If you would remember the vision we shared. Few are privileged to work at my side."

"Like the Tetraps? Look what the poor Lakertians endured?" Ray asked her. Vitreum said nothing.

"They were fools. Decadent weak creatures. Not worthy to serve me. They should have died out eons ago."

"All for your stupid Loyhargil!" Ray laughed. "Remember the loyhargil, Vitreum! She would have destroyed the universe to have helium 2!"

A sickening slap crossed Ray's face. "That is not to be referred to. If you value your consciousness. Privileges must be earned. Do you wish to be sedated"

"Stop!" Vitreum cried, grabbing the Rani's hand. "She was only pointing out a possible problem..."

"I care nothing for this being's idle chatter. And if you would be intelligent you would not listen to her ramblings," the Rani hissed, dragging Vitreum away from the table.

"Vitreum! It's not too late!" cried Ray.

"Experiments do tend to loose my interest. I seek something else. My time manipulator can still be constructed. By organic means," the Rani whispered to Vitreum. 

"I know... but..."

"VITREUM!" Ray cried.

"Enough," the Rani shook her head in disgust. Gesturing to one of the bat creatures, she uttered a command. A hissing slithering Tetrap fastened a silence around the mouth of the human female.. Its forked tongue waved provocatively.

"No..." Vitreum protested.

"You do care too much for this human I think," the Rani snorted. "Will it take her death to convince you to obey me""

"No. There is no need for venom." Vitreum bowed her head. Both Rani and her assistant trudged into yet another lab. The chill in the air did not bother the Time Lady. She rivaled in the sterile coldness of perfect atmosphere.

"Mistress, it is good to see you return..."

"Stop your driveling. Is the operating theater ready""

"All is in readiness, for your great return."

"Good. Take the subject then. Be warned. She is not as frail as she seems."

"What is this magnificent creature"" it asked, indicating Ray.

"It is not to be eaten, Yettab. That is an order."

Disappointment flashed around his four eyes. Vitreum narrowed her own two, and gritted, "If this were but ten thousand years earlier, you would be the eaten!" She had to be patient. After all it was only a matter of time before her own secret plan would go into action, and all the sins of the past would be forgiven.

***

Another wheezing shudder sounded across the stormy planet. Slowly the box blinked into the third dimension. Inside, three passengers readied themselves for a rescue mission.

In her room, Ace was packing away her chemistry set. Test tubes and racks disappeared into a wooden cabinet. She was stacking several deodorant cans into a shoulder bag when there was a knock at her door.

"C'mon in. it's open."

Slowly the door swung to. "Am I interrupting anything""

"No. Come in or go away, squirt."

The timid Scot tiptoed into her mess. Shirts and skirts were piled everywhere. Rock posters covered the walls. Here and there were stacked Ace's comprehensive collection of CDs. Silver and red disks weren't even in their covers.

"Doctor says we've landed. Wants to know if yuir coming or not."

"Of course I am. Come on in. Sit anywhere."

Callom plopped down on a chair. Sat right on top of the T-shirts, folding his kilt underneath himself. He completely ignored her messy room.

She turned to see uncertainty in his hazel eyes. That young thin face, slightly freckled was still wary of anything.

"Chill, kid. You look like I'm gonna bite you on the neck."

"I'm jest worried. What if we canna find her? How does yon Doctor even ken if this is the right planet""

"We'll just move onto the next one. Till we find your friend."

"How can ye be so certain? I mean. This is a big universe n" all."

Ace sat down on the end of her unmade bed. "Listen to me, squirt. We are going to find her. Don't you worry. Okay""

For the first time in hours, the Scot actually managed to smile. "Wi' yuir confidence, we'd better not fail. Or else we'd be in real trebble."

"Got that right."

"Love the room. Makes me think of ma ain home."

"Best not to think about that too much."

"No, I guess not," he sighed. "That's the past. I'm a Time Traveler nau."

He sensed a resonance. Despite his efforts not to pry telepathically, he saw vague glimpses of the same confusion. Ace rarely thought of her parents, in the same way he rarely thought of his da, back in Scotland. She remembered the town she grew up in, but certain things were carefully filed into locked drawers. For example, Callom remembered the mountains and moors, but not the basement. Or Miss Fergussen's cooked meals, and not the nights he went hungry. Without food.

Or the sting of a leather belt. When someone was angry. The resonance was so painful it hurt. Was Ace more like him than he thought?

Life made you hard, or life made you scared. Ace was hard; Callom was scared. Afraid to leave the familiar. But dying for adventure beyond. that's why he'd started traveling with Vitreum.

"I'd better go get ma ain stuff together," he said hastily, rising from the chair.

"See you in a few, kid."

In the brightly-lit console room, the Doctor stood with his hands on his hips. Reaching in his pockets, he pulled out a leather case. Slipped out a pair of half-moon glasses with wire frames, and put them on. Checked the atmospheric readings time and again.

He realized someone was looking over his shoulder, from a distance. "Hullo, Callom. All ready to go""

"Aye. But I'm still worried. What if this is the wrong planet."

"don't worry," said the Doctor, still intent over one keyboard. "It isn't."

"But ma powers aren't tha predictable."

"Ace claims the TARDIS isn't either. But the old girl has a good instinct. Uncannily she can materialize in the right place at the right time. it's very frustrating."

"Like ye"" giggled Callom.

Hearing the Scot laugh, he spun round. "I resemble that remark. Do me a favor. Go check the gravity readings across there."

Not touching the console, Callom circled to the panel across from the Doctor. His features were blurred staring through the Time Rotor in its center. "This one""

"what's the output say""

"Atmosphere about 18 percent oxygen, 60 percent argon. And some nitrogen thrown in fer guid measure. Doesna sound that safe, wi all that argon though."

"No problem."

"Wind velocity's about 150 kph. Pretty stiff. I dinna want to get caught in that."

"Gravity""

"Bout 1 G. Same as earth's I'd take it."

"Right. Good chance of keeping our feet well on the ground, lad. As long as none of us has fasted, that is."

Callom shook his head. Walked over to an old-fashioned coat rack near the double doors. Reached for a long herringbone jacket and scarf. Slipped it on, and wound the scarf several times around his neck.

"Wait up, you two," called Ace, walking into the room. She wore her usual jacket covered in pins and patches like a well-traveled steamer trunk.

Over his question mark pullover sweater, the Doctor put on a long brown coat. In the back it had a sort of belt, and handkerchiefs dangled out of the hip pockets. "Better put on something warm. It is a bit windy out there," he advised.

"Just as long as I don't pass out breathing the air, I'm fine," commented Ace, zipping up her jacket. She put on a striped stocking cap over her dark hair, and a pair of red woolen mittens.

Callom popped his highland bonnet on his head, making sure the ribbons hung down the back of his neck. Slipped on gloves tucked into his jacket sleeves.

"won't you be cold without anything on your knees?" Ace asked him, before the Doctor opened the door. All Callom did was give her a withering look, and shake his head.

"I'm wearing mah wool socks. Wha else should I put on?"

Out into the climate of another world they trudged. Bitter winds whipped past their cheeks. A few bright stars twinkled overhead in a purple sky. On the horizon stretched a band of sherbet green. Slowly a green sun was rising. Already a large red disc loomed on the horizon.

"That's the planet Tetrabyria," said the Doctor, raising his voice over the howling wind. Crags and spires pointed toward a huge dome of night. 

"Och, ye mean we're on a moon? And Tetrabyria is a gas giant... like Jupiter?"

"Yes, lad, that's right. you've learned your astronomy well."

"Thanks to Raina," said the young Scot sadly.

"let's get a move on," shouted Ace, moving ahead. She pulled out her baseball bat."I'll take the point."

The ends of Callom's ribbons swirled past his neck. He had to hold his bonnet on his head with one hand, and clutch his jacket collar shut with the other. "Wha a crazy place!" he called. "who'd want to live here""

"The inhabitants are under the surface, Callom," explained the Doctor. They walked together after Ace. Fumbling in his breast pocket, the Time Lord pulled out a pocket watch. Lifted the silver lid. Except the watch gleamed with tiny flashing lights.

"Some timepiece, Doctor. Doesna look like any watch I've seen."

"it's a space mystery. Tells me things that are more useful than just the time."

"Of course. What wuild a Time Lord need wi a watch," muttered Callom, shouldering his bag and following them.

If he shut his eyes, he could hear songs in the wind. Like the wind on the moors of Scotland. Such pretending was so tempting, so he focussed his mind on Raina instead. That resonance now sang in his brain. Back when they first met, she had placed a piece of her mind into his, and he had into hers. A permanent fixture, like a window or a door. A telephone line down which their communications drifted. Unlike many beings, her mind operated at a much different wavelength. He had to have her step up his thoughts through a psychic loudspeaker to let her hear his.

that's why she wore that headband. Called it a psychosideric modulator. Let her translate other creature's brain waves into a pattern she could discern. Also it served to focus her raw psychic powers. Without it, she'd go mad.

It also served to protect her from attacks. Mental attacks. Since she was one of the species that had genetically engineered itself to mimic humanoid brain frequencies. If she was a normal Mantissan, she'd be immune to telepathic manipulation by humanoids. No one could read her mind, because they couldn't pick up her high frequency thoughts.

Time Lords didn't have this advantage. Even though their brains were more powerful, their minds still operated in the wavelength range close to humans. that's why some of them could discern human thoughts. Not always that well.

"Hey Doctor! Wait!"

"What""

"I feel the resonance. Over that way!"

Both males ran to catch up with Ace. To tell her she was headed in the wrong direction. Now daylight was illuminating the landscape around them. High craggy mountains pierced the level horizon, higher than many on Earth. Glancing briefly at the ground around him, Callom thought he was walking on limestone. Certainly it was porous. Coral reefs could have built up this landscape. Or stromatellites. Callom recalled that calcium carbonate in limestone usually came from a biological source. But what had dried up the oceans"

Raina might know. If they could find her.

"Ace! Come back! Callom feels a lead . . . "

No Ace. The landscape was empty of her.

"Uh oh,"

"What d' ye mean, uh oh?"

"There are these creatures, called Tetraps. Nasty lot. Encountered them before."

"Wha do they look like?"

"Large, hairy, and batlike. But you don't get a good enough look till they're right on top of you."

"Ye ken they can fly?"

"Right. And they literally have eyes in the back of their heads."

"they'd make good teachers?"

"Well, mebbe she's just around the corner. Scouting ahead, she said."

"Ace! Where are you!" yelled the Doctor, cupping his hands around his mouth.

"Ace! C'mon out, lass!" cried Callom's treble voice against the base din.

A swishing noise enveloped the Doctor. Callom jumped out of the way of a crackling net that dropped from nowhere.

He spun about, smelling oily fur. A hissing grimacing muzzle was near him. 

Instinctively, the Scots lad shut his eyes. A switch closed in his mind, a gland oozed a chemical.

To leave a batlike creature blinking its four eyes in confusion. Callom gripped the limestone spire from a distance of a few meters away. He could see the Doctor struggling inside a sparkling energy web. Valiantly he fought to get out.

"Those bat things, are they the Tetraps"" Callom wondered, squinting to get a better look. "they're no familiar wi" teleporting, luckily."

"ACE!" shouted the Doctor wildly, getting himself more tangled then ever. His eyes widened as the Tetrap reeled in the net. It was fired out of some sort of special gun. 

Howling, a girl jumped from above. She swung her baseball bat. Unfortunately for her, the Tetrap's rear eye spotted her. All she succeeded in doing was grazing its shoulder.

Another Tetrap swooped down. Ace retreated, bat extended. Shoulder the weapon, and swung at the grasping claws. The Tetrap lunged, and she managed to score a hit.

A net gun fired, from the first Tetrap. Narrowly it missed the teenager. "You creeps won't get me that easily," she taunted.

However, the other recovered, and raised its net gun. Ace looked both ways at the creatures. couldn't go left or right.

Callom felt sick. What could he do? "Wait a minnit. What is a Tetrap scared of?"

Reaching out with his mind, he scanned. Their brains were chattering records in reverse. But their thoughts were discernable. The young Scot thought of the biology text. Bats ate insects, right?

"Try this, beasties!" he cried, putting his hands to his head.

Instantly the two Tetraps howled, and hissed. Ran about wildly flapping their membranous wings. Ace clobbered the net guns from their hands. 

"Htom! Htom!" they hissed, and disappeared in a flutter of oily fur.

"Mega!" cried Ace, glancing around. "Scared "em off."

"Ace, once you stopped congratulating yourself, do you mind""

"Oh, sorry Professor. didn't see you there."

Indignantly the Doctor put his hands on his hips. Difficult to do, when you were laying spread eagle on the ground.

"This oughta keep you out of trouble," she laughed, trudging over to him as he struggled with the net.

"OW! Just extricate me from this entanglement."

"don't get yourself wrapped up any more than you are," she said, trying to keep from laughing. "I'll find something to cut you out with."

"Do be careful, Ace. I'm not wrapped in twine, you know."

Callom rushed out to them both. "Are ye okay?" he asked.

"Where were you hiding, squirt?"

"Dinna blame me. Ye were doin fine, lass. I shuild ask ye where ye disappeared to, scaring us like that!"

"Spotted Batman's reject relatives, and wanted to catch them by surprise,"

"OW! Do you mind?"

"Stop grousing Professor. I'm doing the best I can here."

Reaching into his sock, Callom pulled out his knife. "Will this help?"

"Not against titanium strands," sighed the Doctor.

"Good job I was here to get you out of this mess," said Ace. She grabbed a piece of rock, and started to saw at the fibers. Callom tried his best with his serrated knife.

"I rather think it wasn't your antics," said the Doctor. At last he could move his legs. 

"What are you on about" I showed up in the nick of time."

"They were terrified of something. And it wasn't a teenager with an aluminum sided rounders stick."

"that's the thanks I get for saving your butt," she griped. "Can you move your hands now?"

"Yes, thank you."

"So if I didn't scare them what did" Some high frequency ultrasonic thing you whipped up?"

"Not me. Callom."

"Callom? Get real," said Ace. 

"I did, lass," said the young Scot shyly.

"How?"

"I thought of what a bat wuild be scared of."

"But I didn't see anything…"

"You didn't," said the Doctor, sitting up. Wincing, he dusted himself down with his handkerchief. "But they did."

"Stop speaking in riddles."

"Callom is as I suspected a psycho projector. His power is to tune into the cerebral cortexes of brains to imprint images."

"Aye. Tha's the scientific way o putting it, yes."

"Wait a minute," said Ace, putting a hand to her head. "You mean to tell me he's like a television broadcasting antennae?"

"Crudely, yes. He telepathically transmits images to brains. Most of the visual processing is in the brain, not the eyes. So it looks like there is something there, but it isn't."

"But what did they see""

"A giant moth," laughed the Doctor, slapping his thighs. "Brilliant, my lad."

"Thank ye," smiled the Scots boy.

"Okay, guys. We got a lot of ground to cover," said Ace, helping the Doctor to his feet. "let's get out of this wind storm."

A few minutes later, with Callom's scrying, the trio found the cave entrance. Gratefully they slipped into the narrow aperture, at a forty-five degree angle from the ground. They had to duck down to get inside. Morosely the cave moaned the farther they trekked inside.

When the winds faded to a background white noise, the Doctor stopped everyone. They could hear him fumbling through his pockets. "Must have a torch here somewhere," he muttered.

Seconds later his face appeared in a small shaft of light. He clutched a rectangular hand flashlight, the type you could buy in a gas station. "Are you goin to tell a ghost story?" Ace asked him.

"Whatever makes you ask that?"

"I dunno. Swing the flashlight outta your face, and let's see where we are."

The beam swung around in a circle. Gradually their eyes were adjusting to the reduced light. No outside light penetrated this far down.

Impatiently, Ace pulled a more substantial flashlight out of her backpack. It was one of those heavy metal ones a camper would take. The type with a fluorescent panel in it. She beamed it the opposite direction as the Doctor.

"How far d" ye think we're under?" asked Callom.

"Oh, off the bat I'd say six meters. Enough to stop and consider what we're about to undertake."

"Please, dinna mention the word "bat", Doctor."

In the rectangle view they saw the red rock walls. Small spongy holes glittered with tiny rock crystals in the rusty matrix. "Hmm. Looks like sedimentary rock to me," muttered the Doctor. He pulled a small geological hammer out of his pocket, and chipped at the walls.

"Ere, there's time for that later," said Ace. 

Hand on his shoulder strap, Callom glanced forwards and backwards. The hair on his knees stood on end, and he shivered. "Er, ken we get movin?" he asked. "The psi trace is stronger t" the left."

"Very well. Lead on, McDuff," said the Doctor.

"Mah name's McPherson, if ye please," snapped Callom, highland pride aroused.

"Just a saying, lad."

Further down they trudged. The cavern floor angled gently downwards. Umbrella in one hand, the Doctor held his flashlight in the other. He brought up the rear of the party. Up ahead, Callom carried Ace's large fluorescent lantern. Each step filled him with further dread. To have darkness in front of him was just as unnerving as to have it behind him. Behind him, Ace walked, eyes flicking back and forth on the narrow passage walls.

A pungent smell grew stronger. "Phew, what's that?" asked Callom, wrinkling his young nose.

"Smells like bird caca," muttered Ace to herself.

"We are in a live cave," commented the Doctor. He appeared as calm as a professor walking into a lecture hall before class.

" You mean I'm smelling bat droppings"" asked Callom. "I ken guess who made "em."

"Better cover your mouths, children. We could be walking into a rookery."

"Not of those Tetraps, I hope."

"No. The smell would more closely resemble human excrement."

"How can you be so blasted calm?" asked Ace.

"I'll take the point, if you don't mind," sniffed the Doctor, hurt. Clamping a handkerchief over his nose, he handed his umbrella to Callom and strode into the room.

In here, the ceiling soared much higher. Thin translucent stalactites, called soda straws, nestled next to huge dripping pillars. 

"Phwagh," gasped Callom, pulling his tartan scarf over his mouth and nose. "What a stench!"

Ace trudged ahead, pulling her jacket collar around her mouth. Underneath their feet, a white paste carpeted the cavern floor. Tiny squeaks echoed from the ceiling. Normal bats fluttered and jockeyed for position on the various gallery roofs. They didn't notice the Doctor and his two companions. Only when Ace beamed her flashlight up directly onto the roof did the clouds disperse and flap around them.

"Hmm. Must be their plasma source," muttered the Doctor.

"What?"

"I'd reckon they either eat these bats, or make another use of them entirely." He gingerly tiptoed through the white mass, occasionally lifting his black and white shoes to stare at the bottoms. 

"This white stuff," said Ace, squatting down on her haunches. "Looks a lot like potassium nitrate."

"how'd it get here?" asked Callom.

Hand clamping the handkerchief, the Doctor pointed up at the ceiling. "Och, gross!" winced the Scot. 

"Just be glad you're wearing a hat," quipped Ace.

All three dashed through the chamber, as fast as their legs would carry them. Fortunately, none were gifted with the raw potassium nitrate. "Am I glad to be out of there," sighed Ace. "That place pongs worse than Liverpool."

Callom once more stood in one place, eyes blinking shut. He stood quite still through the dark. The Doctor could discern the stretching of his psychic probes as he listened for Vitreum's thoughts. "So far so guid," he announced, after a few moments. "Right on track."

"I was thinking, Professor."

"What about…"

"Those two Tetraps on the surface. Why would they be out there, if they're bats, when the sun was coming up""

"Routine patrols. The Rani leaves nothing to chance."

"Does tha mean she was expecting us?"

"Not necessarily."

"But they could be reporting us to her right now, Professor," pointed out Ace. "we'd better shake a leg."

"Right. Come on, lad. Don't fail us now. Listen like you've never before."

Huge underground caverns stretched for miles. Rough-hewn caves dotted the walls of the vast spaces like some subterranean rookery. No light got down this far, save the natural cold phosphorescence of some mineral deposits.

Black light was beamed at intervals, transforming dull minerals into a rainbow fantasy of hidden colors. Oranges, ghostly greens, and reds shone out in the purple hued environment. White appeared phosphorescent purple, and blacks the darkest shade of violet. No normal light existed down here to show the true colors of this world.

Thousands upon thousands of Tetraps fluttered amongst the spires and stalactites. Aside from the alien environment, it seemed like a normal bustling population. Tetrap markets sold Tetrap plasma in squirt bottles. Tetrap males and females bustled to and fro from work to cave home. Tetrap babies clung close to their mother's oily breasts and suckled Tetrap milk. Except when everyone landed, they fastened upside down.

To a Tetrap, there was no sky. Human notions of up and down were not applicable. Their entire moon was honeycombed with similar underground cities. Only when they needed to hunt did they venture to the surface.

Yet, this civilization had a ruler. A great scientist who had brought their planet domination and the marvels of science. As before they flapped to their halls of leaning, but with a difference. Now science was a part of the curriculum. Strange new plants and creatures thrived on the planet's surface above. Tetrap scientists and technicians toiled away to produce devices to make life simpler.

But their lives were incredibly more complex. In one generation they'd graduated from living in caves, hunting bats to stabbing computer keys and sucking refined plasma. Such a quick transition did not come without a price.

A price paid to the Rani.

How cleverly they'd absconded her from Lakertia. Yet, how cleverly she'd plotted against this contingency. She well knew they'd bite the neck that fed them. And wove her counter measures accordingly. She'd given them their trinkets in exchange for her freedom. And it worked well. What better place to base her operations than a subterranean moon hurtling around a gas giant in some obscure star system"

Clad in scarlet, she rested hands upon slender hips. Allowed herself a smile of satisfaction. It had taken much time and energy to resume her research after the Doctor foiled her plans on Lakertia. But she'd learned from the experience. There would be no more mistakes. No more Loyhargil or Helium Two. From now on, it was biogenetic.

She'd courted with Dastari and the Third Zoners. Learned their precious techniques. Flirted with the opportunity of enslaving androgums, but abandoned that plan. They were simply too stupid to serve as good help. Too driven by their basic appetites. Yes, they possessed the necessary strength and energy, but they were obsessed with pleasure. Too much like the Lakertians. Genetic augmentation failed miserably.

The Tetraps were another story. They were intelligent enough to understand her science, yet not so driven by basic lust. A Tetrap could appreciate what technology brought. 

Until she heard of the Mantissans. A race that manipulated its own genes to evolve. She just had to get her hands on one. Such a race was developing time travel and means of temporal manipulation beyond machines like a TARDIS. Some were rumored to have woven time travel ability into a psionic power akin to teleportation.

Carefully had she researched the more humanoid races. Their genes were easier to manipulate. Normal Mantissans were just too difficult to achieve what she wanted. As soon as she could change them, they'd adapt to change her programming.

But she'd done her research. Like the Time Lords, there were renegades from Genome society. One such person came to her attention when she landed on Mantissa. A young scientist named Fiona Vitreum. She taught telepaths to use their powers. And she had an insatiable hunger for science.

A hunger that the Rani exploited. Innocent, Vitreum became a good assistant. Tetrapbyria was fast becoming the center of the known academia. As a research center and arising galactic power.

Vitreum, one time assistant to the Rani, looked up from her console. Miserably she glanced at the oily muzzles around her. They all hung upside down in relation to her frame of reference. She sat up, pulling her violet sash with its metallic pins across her chest. Brushed off her violet quilted jacket. The white streaks in her hair glinted purple under the ultraviolet light. Luckily, it didn't hurt her eyes.

"Mistress Rani wishes you well, and gives you this gift of her affections," hissed Yettab, his tongue flicking between yellow fangs. In his claws he held a microcomputer bracelet, identical to the Rani's.

Slowly Vitreum reached for the bangle. Yettab slipped it over her thin wrist. "Ow!" she cried, feeling tiny pricks into her skin. Twisting the bracelet, she could not remove it, for it bonded molecularly to her epidermis. Just like the headpiece she always wore, she could not remove the device.

"Now you cannot leave us," he said.

"Where would I have to go"" she asked him, sadly. "it's my own fault this. Always messing things up for people."

She shuddered under the soft caress of a tongue against her cheek. Shivered as she half expected the tip to penetrate and hurl her into paralysis. Yet he was toying with her, as a cat is toyed with when its owner dangles yarn before its pouncing claws.

It was a psionic nullifier. Vitreum despaired as her psionic link crumbled. Perhaps it was just as well. If Callom couldn't find her, he'd have the sense to stay away and not be recaptured.

In her mind she saw him, frail and weak. Yet brave beneath the human frailness. He'd give his life to save hers, such was human self-sacrifice. She had a responsibility for his safety, and took it upon herself to ensure his escape. It was she who bundled him into the long-range transporter, urging him to teleport. To her terror she saw him dematerialize, only to fail to reappear to the coordinates she'd set.

The Rani sighed at the loss of her experiment. An anti-escape device was triggered, hurling the occupant of the chamber into hyperspace. It was as if Callom was trapped in the dimension through which he teleported. A half "port.

Hours ago she could swear she heard him. In their special rapport. But she was half drugged at the time. How could he possibly reach her when the Rani's TARDIS wound its way through the Vortex"

"Nae!" shrieked Callom, clutching his wrist. 

The Doctor rushed to his side. "What is it?"

"Something burning... in ma arm," he gasped, twisting his hand over where the pain spread. "The burning traveling up . . ."

"He's too young to have a heart attack,"

"Do be quiet, Ace!"

Callom struggled to stop the tears flowing from his eyes. Slowly the pain died down, and he let go. On either side of him, Ace and the Doctor glanced at each other puzzled. "She . . . she's gone," he croaked.

"What do you mean, gone?"

"I canna feel her in ma mind anymore."

"That doesn't mean she's," began Ace.

"Shush, this is important."

"Oh, all right."

"Why else woulna I feel her"" asked Callom.

"Someone might have blotted out her thoughts, and terminated your psionic link. A local psi-damping transmitter would have that effect."

"It felt like pain, and then nothing. As if someone cut a phone line," gasped Callom, catching his breath. "Niver have I felt her so strongly, then so suddenly was it cut off."

"You're mind's accustomed to her presence. You were suffering withdrawal symptoms," explained the Doctor, gently. "The Rani must know we're onto her trail. Otherwise she would not bother to silence the transmission of Vitreum's thoughts."

"So what now, Professor?"

"We must rescue her, of course," said the Doctor. 

"But how are we going to find her!"

"Simple. We let the Rani capture us."

"What? Are ye daft!" cried Callom. At almost the same moment Ace cried, "Are you mad""

"How else are we going to find her?" asked the Doctor. 

"But she'll experiment on us and kill us, won't she," snapped Ace. 

"Not necessarily. She may be ruthless and amoral, but she is still a scientist. And most scientists can be reasoned with, on some level."

"How are you going to reason wi' someone WHO's your worst enemy?" asked Ace.

"I didn't say that she was my worst enemy, Ace. Just that we've crossed swords in the paths of our journeys. She seeks knowledge for its own sake. Not for power, but because she is who she is. Unlike the Master, who wishes merely to rule the universe, the Rani wishes to understand it and make it in her own image."

"I dinna ken how yuir goin to help Vitreum by selling out to the Rani."

"I won't be selling out to her, Callom. What kind of person do you think I am?"

"A daft chap."

"Got that right, squirt."

Right into Tetrap central they blundered. All three of them strained their necks taking in the height of the Great Chamber. The roof was so high they could barely make out the variations in the rocks. Scant crystals gleamed a gentle green.

"Wild!" gasped Ace, glancing around the chamber. "Like a discotheque in here!"

"It's the ultraviolet light the Tetraps use," explained the Doctor, kneeling by one rock. His straw hat glowed pale purple, as did the tips of his shirt. Alternating red and white squares on Callom's Highlander bonnet shone purple and light purple around his head. 

She gasped, "Totally Brill!"

Ghostly shapes fluttered far away. Metal struts held up small spherical units with tiny holes in them. In and out poked the heads of Tetraps. This was their version of skyscrapers, only the stacks of spheres were like houses.

Small hovercraft buzzed by, filled to the gills with dozens of Tetraps. Squeaks and shouts echoed as they raced from platform to platform. No one took notice of the three strange creatures standing on the vast cavern floor. Mighty stalactites and stalagmites partitioned off the views of adjoining caverns. Each stretched for miles and miles into a homogenous gloom.

Yet, like a modern city the reds, oranges and greens of the fluorescent minerals lit up the dwellings like neon signs. Paints made of the minerals plastered cave walls in weird Tetrabyrian writing. "Look Doc, they even have graffiti!" laughed Ace, pointing to them.

The Doctor just shook his head. "Unbelievable. This shouldn't be!"

"They look like they're in London!" exclaimed Callom, scratching in front of his ears. "Complete w" pollution an hover cars. If I didna ken better, I'd feel like I was George Jetson!"

"Why don't they notice us?" asked Ace.

"Perhaps we should draw some attention to ourselves. Sure you can manage that, Ace?"

"Yes," she answered, then stopped herself and glared daggers at him. "Hey!"

Callom covered his mouth to keep from laughing. 

"Hey! Bat face!" shouted Ace, to a parked hovercar. "Over here! Your mother was a blacking brush!"

"TahW?" hissed some of the Tetraps in the hovercar. Through their multiple eyes they fixed on Ace.

"Namuh?" said one, pointing to Callom and Ace.

"Amsalp!" called the Doctor, cupping his hands. "Eerf amsalp! Ees Eenar!"

"Tahw!"

Again the Doctor shouted, this time, jumping up and down, "Eerf amsalp! Eenar eht ees oot tnaw I!"

"Amsalp!" they cried in unison. Wheezing the engine up, the car sped in their general direction. Ace reached for her bat, but the Doctor stopped her.

Inches from them the car stopped abruptly. Hissing and licking their fangs the four Tetraps exited the car. Ace and Callom shuddered as they encroached. The teenager protectively wrapped her arms around the young Scot's shoulders. Callom gripped her hand tightly.

Calmly the Doctor doffed his hat and smiled. "Olleh! Eenar eht ees ot hsiw I."

"What the heck kind of language is that?" asked Ace, still clutching hold of a trembling Callom.

"Try English, spoken backwards," he stammered.

"You, will come with us," hissed the tallest of the Tetraps, spreading out its web arms to their full span.

An hour's journey by hovercar later, the doctor's party arrived. Smiles had turned to serious frowns as the Time Lord took in the view around himself. As for Ace, she moved closer to Callom, who himself sat on the edge of the hovercar seat. She could tell his skin crawled as much as hers seeing these Tetraps everywhere. Bravely he clenched his teeth and said nothing the entire trip.

"It's okay, squirt," she whispered. "The Doctor knows what he's doing. I hope."

Grimly Callom nodded. Lowered his eyes and withdrew into himself. He didn't even notice Ace's arm across his shoulders, jammed as they were together on the car seat.

Consulting his mystery watch, the Doctor grunted in self-approval. He slipped off his half moon glasses and replaced them in the inner pocket of his jacket. Calmly as ever he crossed his plaid pant knees and rested both hands on his question mark umbrella handle. "Ah, now we shall get to the bottom of this mystery, Ace," he said.

"Whatever. But you just remember why we're here, Professor."

"Not even for a minute will I forget," he assured, her, raising one finger and touching the side of his nose.

Dim blue lights outlined a door. The tall Tetrap gestured to another standing next to the passage. He raised a claw in salute. With a squeak, the guard raised his web gun to cover the hovercar passengers.

"Get out," he hissed.

Ace, Callom, and the Doctor obliged. With hands raised above their heads they marched into a long narrow passageway. Tetrap guards followed from behind them. A grunt for left and right guided them past small round doors lined with some sort of flexible rubber.

"Och, this looks verra familiar, Doctor," said Callom, speaking at last.

"Does it, now?"

"Aye. I think I was here before."

"Oh great," grumbled Ace.

Finally they were escorted through a large set of double doors. That same blue light reflected off its cold metal surface. One Tetrap guard raised his wrist, and spoke into a mini-computer bracelet.

Doors glided open with a metallic clanking. The Doctor raised his eyebrows, saying, "Rather melodramatic, isn't it?"

"No kidding, Sherlock," retorted Ace.

Huge glass cages were set into a series of walls. It was like walking into a natural history museum. Inside enormous jars floated life size dinosaurs and woolly mammoths. Along one wall were a series of bizarre squid creatures. The Doctor froze when he saw them.

"What are they?"

"Nestines," he gritted. "In their natural form. And those over there are Sontarans."

Callom followed his gaze to several short squat creatures, with massive limbs. Their domed heads with lipless slits sat on short necks. Each looked identical to the other. Metallic threads were worked into their skins.

"How'd she get her hands on them, I'd like to know? Sontarans are some of the most militaristic creatures in the Twelve galaxies! Here they are, minus their armor."

"This looks just like a zoo," said Ace.

"Aye," muttered Callom, shivering. His bare knees under his kilt felt like they were knocking together.

"Hang on, squirt." she soothed.

"I hate lookin at dead things flotin in jars," he gasped, turning pale.

"I'm not crazy about it either," she admitted. "I weaseled my way out of Biology, A-Level."

They came at last to a central chamber. Huge tubes bubbled and surged with a strange blue fluid. Many of them ran directly into the tanks. "Mm, large scale cryostasis," commented the Doctor, looking on in admiration.

Before them, with her back turned to them stood a shapely figure. Long hair rippled down its back. Her short tunic flared to a bell skirt over well-muscled legs. "Ah, Doctor. I should have guessed you'd visit me again."

"You've surpassed yourself again, Rani," said the Doctor calmly.

Whirling about, she folded her arms across her chest. Ace stared at the severe face and aristocratically chiseled features. "She's wearing too much mascara," she muttered to herself. 

"Too kind, Doctor. I may return the compliment, but I won't. I do tire of your unexpected visits to my laboratories."

"You mean visits to your killing jar," coughed the Doctor. Lowering his hands, he marched right up to her.

"As always, your limited vision bores me, Doctor."

"Let's cut the crap," snapped Ace, walking up beside the Doctor. "Where the hell is Raina""

Amusement crossed the Rani's features. "Who is this spirited creature""

"Er, this is my companion, Ace," stammered the Doctor. "She's young."

"I can see that," chortled the Rani. 

"I'm not scared of you," said Ace, narrowing her young eyes. "Or all this stuff."

"I don't believe you are, human. I am certain the Doctor has said many unflattering things about me. But that changes nothing. He will not stop me again. Too many times has he meddled in my affairs."

"But why are you always doing experiments on people"" asked Ace, despite the Doctor's attempts to shut her up.

"Do your earth scientists ask the rabbits and bacteria if they can experiment on them""

"That's different!" said Ace. "We're sentient. They're not."

"To me, you are as monkeys," said the Rani. "Intelligent monkeys."

At these words, she seized Ace's chin in her long manicured fingers. "You are an excellent specimen, human. I can see you were well bred. Such drive to survive. Typical of your species."

"Let me go, you witch!" she snapped, raising her hands and bashing them down on the Rani's. Instantly a Tetrap smacked the teenager to the floor. Callom cried out in anger, knife drawn as he charged the Tetrap. "You leave her alone, y' beastie!"

Quickly the Doctor moved and pulled Ace from harm's way. So quick was Callom's reaction, that his dirk drew blood. Angrily, the outraged Tetrap guard spanned his wings to engulf the young Scot. The Rani lifted a restraining hand. "Do not damage the humans, Yettab. I will have use for them."

"Like you have use for every life form other than Time Lords?" asked the Doctor, as he supported his friend. "Easy now, I have you shhh"

Spitting blood, Ace shook her head. The whole room slowly orbited. "Oh, cripes what a blow!"

Instantly the Scot came to her side, and crouched on his haunches. The Doctor had Ace's head on his lap. Gently he took her head and shoulders onto his knees. "Rest easy, lass," he soothed, stroking her hair. She spat blood again, and coughed. Apparently her nose was bleeding. Carefully, the Doctor took a handkerchief and pressed it over her nose. Still stunned, she huddled against him.

"A typical human response to another human in danger. As I predicted," smiled the Rani, looking at Callom and Ace.

"We seek Raina," said the Doctor simply, helping Ace to stand shakily. "This human boy says that you are experimenting on her against her will. I have come to take her away. Whatever you're doing here on Tetrapbyria is your concern."

"True. But what gave you the idea Raina is here against her will" Or being experimented upon""

"She said so herself!" snapped Callom.

"Very well, she shall be released. Yettab, bring the human female"

Cursing and swearing, a short woman with brown hair was brought forth, yelling curses that Ace knew well, in an American accent. "Damn you let me go!" she screamed.

"Raina!" cried Callom as they brought her out, and freed her wrists.

"Kid, you got back! Who is this?"

"I presume you are Dr. Raina MacLaren the geologist from UCLA/Berkely?" the Doctor asked.

"Yes, but who are you?"

"We are friends. Do you relinquish her?" asked the Doctor of the Rani.

"Take her from me. She has served her purpose," said the Rani, and they flung her toward the Doctor and Callom. She collapsed and landed on her knee, her khaki shorts and her t-shirt torn, her vest in tatters.

"Raina," whispered the kid as he held her, and the Doctor helped her to her feet. She promptly dropped to her knees.

"You're safe now," said the Doctor, helping her to sit down. "Relax."

"Damn, I can't believe this nightmare" she gasped.

"Easy Yank," said Ace, walking up to her and helping to support her. She saw the full sized letter logo of a rock band she'd seen in the seventies, and four figures in black and white paint on Raina's chest, as the Geologist leaned on her.

"Vitreum, please, is she hurt?" asked Callom. "She wanted to come with us she said she"

"Ah, yes, she may have said that at one point. But I assure you she is here because she wishes to be."

"What"" asked the Doctor, raising an eyebrow.

"Just show us where she is," coughed Ace. Callom tightened his grip on her protectively as he glared at the Tetrap guards.

"Right here," said the Rani. "Vitreum, why don't you come out. You have some visitors who are anxious to see you."

From behind one tank walked another woman. She was clad in a quilted jacket and tight pants. Her mop of brown hair was streaked with a few bleached white locks that hung over her eyes. Light flashed off the multiple pins adorning her velvet sash and the glasses on her nose. Her eyes were weary and tired. The face was soft and pale, with a pointed chin and freckles.

"Hello, Doctor," she said in a British accent, English crisp and precise. "I have heard much about you. It is a great honor to finally meet you in person."

"Tell them," said the Rani, folding her arms across her chest. "They accuse me of kidnapping you."

"Are you being held here against your will?" asked the Doctor.

"No," she said simply. He eyed the microcomputer bracelet on her wrist.

"What do ye mean, no?" cried Callom, confused. Still he crouched next to Ace.

"I was afraid you'd come after me," she said dispassionately. "I thought I told you to leave."

"Ye said fer me to save mahself! Before ye stuck me in that transporter!"

"He's right," said Raina. "but don't expect HER to help you"

"Do you think I want to be burdened with you"" she asked, flatly. "You, always tagging along at my heels like some lap dog? You had your chance, and you failed me. I didn't want you to come back."

"Nae, it canna be true," protested Callom, distressed.

"What are you talking about?" asked the Doctor.

"The Rani let me help him escape. She knew you'd be at those coordinates."

"I don't believe this!" cried Callom. "You canna mean what yuir saying!"

"Believe it, she's sold out," Raina said bitterly.

"Doctor, I am the Rani's assistant. I am helping her to build a better world for the Tetraps. Is it too much to ask to be let to help a civilization flourish""

"Yes it is! I mean, no it isn't," stammered the Doctor, tapping his umbrella.

"You after all, interfere in the affairs of other people,"

"Yes, and that's what I do well. I'm just concerned about the direction in which the Tetraps are evolving!"

"So you are against interference?"

"No, that is to say, I support what you are doing, Rani and Vitreum. I would love to hear what you're doing. Lately I have seen the error in my ways poking my nose into your experiments."

"I seek to assist the Tetraps in building a better society," said the Rani.

"And I am helping her. I don't want to come back with you."

"But I want to help too!" snapped the Doctor, stamping his foot in frustration.

"Forget her," said Raina. "We're just pawns to her experiments"

"No, Doctor," said the Rani. "Your loyalties exist elsewhere. If you leave now, my Tetraps will guarantee your safe conduct. You may even take these two humans. But the longer you stay, the more I am convinced you are meddling in affairs that don't concern you. I no longer wish to reshape the Universe, only study it."

"That may very well be but"

"Doctor, take this boy, and leave me," said Vitreum. "And take the human woman as well."

"No Vitreum!" cried Callom, in anguish. "Yuir daft! she's controlling yuir mind!"

"Callom, she's betrayed us," Raina said flatly.

"Stop your whimpering, boy," snapped Vitreum. "I never wanted you to come along with me in the STAGE! You just got in the way!"

"But the training you gave me . . . when you had me come to you on EARTH"

"Your powers are useless, and you are too. Your father was right about you. I merely came to Earth to kidnap you and Dr. MacLaren."

"No!"

"Doctor, I ask you kindly to leave me. It is unfortunate that you wasted your time and energy to find that I am unwilling to come with you."

"I understand, Vitreum," he said, raising his hat. Turning to the Rani, he said, "Sorry to have troubled you. Must be going."

"What the hell?" coughed Ace. Raina helped her to her feet, and the teenager let the human woman help her along.

"we're leaving. If Vitreum doesn't want to come, that's her decision."

"We canna leave her," sniffed Callom.

"We have no choice, she's made her decision, I'm sorry kid we can't trust her," Raina gritted.

"Look, the Rani's not endangering anyone. I see no evidence that she's working on anything threatening right now. So we'd better get back to the TARDIS."

"I'm not going till you explain . . ."

"Just for once in your short life, do what I say, Ace!" he thundered.

"Touchy, isn't he?" Raina asked as she helped Ace along.

***

A morose foursome threaded their way back to the surface of the moon. Part of the journey was by hovercar, the other in the company of three Tetraps. All through the journey, Callom said nothing, and cried not a single tear. Ace just sat next to him, saying nothing in her anger at the Doctor, who sat on Callom's left. Raina kept her arm around Callom.

"There's something strange about how she acted," said Ace, breaking the silence at last.

"Later, Ace," snapped the Doctor, intimating the guards to her.

"Okay, everyone wants me to shut up, I may as well," she snapped sullenly.

"I just want to know how we're going to get out of here and back to Earth," Raina mumbled.

"You'll see," The Doctor nodded.

Through the small gap in the rocks they squirmed. Still Callom said nothing. Like a robot, he walked stiffly towards the distant spires. Ace shouldered her pack, and followed in silence. Last came the Doctor. Turning to the Tetraps, he said, "I think we can take it from here, thank you very much."

Nodding, the three guards turned and departed in a few flaps of their membranous wings. They were alone on the moon, with the wind howling in their ears. A few minutes walk brought them back to the familiar Police Box with its flashing blue light on top. As the Doctor produced his key, he muttered to himself. 

"What the hell is this?" Raina asked.

"My TARDIS my time ship" said the Doctor. "If you know the Rani, you must remember she had a similar device."

"If you're a TIME lord how can I trust you?" Raina asked.

"Ye can, he came to save us," Callom pulled her hand. Raina sighed, too tired to argue.

"Well, that was a wasted trip," Ace said.

"Come on, let's not hang about, shall we," said the Doctor softly. 

"Why should you care what I think," Ace snorted.

His hand rested on her shoulder. "Coming?"

Into the control room they walked. Raina gasped at the immensity, blinking in the light. Two double doors banished the howling winds outside. Tossing his hat onto the rack, the Doctor touched the three control levers for dematerialization. Callom headed right for the door leading to the rest of the TARDIS. A wheezing groan vibrated the room. They were off.

"So now what?" Raina asked.

"I'll attempt my utmost to return you home Dr. MacLaren," the Doctor said. 

"So tired," she groaned.

"Callom, show her a room where she can rest, will you?"

"Yes, come this way," he whispered, and led her away with him.

"Ace,"

"What do you want?"

"I'm sorry I yelled at you, back in the cave. Things weren't going according to plan."

"According to plan?" laughed Ace bitterly. "According to plan? I get my nose busted, Callom is crying his eyes out, and all you care about is that things aren't going according to your plan!"

"I didn't think Vitreum would want to stay."

"She can take her broom and ride on it, for all I damn the hell care," snapped Ace. "I'm going to bed."

"Ace, please stop and talk to me."

"Why" You never listen to me anyway."

"that's not true. I was trying to discover the Rani's plan."

"Does it occur to you she may not have one" you're so used to fighting monsters you think somebody is trying to take over the universe every place we land."

"I know the Rani, Ace. she's got something up her sleeve. And the way Vitreum was speaking to Callom proves it."

"What do you mean?"

"didn't you notice that she was going out of her way to make him hate her" Saying all those nasty things to him, when she simply could have told him to leave. That emotion stemmed out of concern."

"Some concern. She doesn't give a flying flamingo about him."

"She does. She wanted Callom to be safe. Away from the Rani. That means that Callom was once important to the Rani's plan."

"Oh, so you mean she was just putting us on?"

"Yes. Trying to tell me something. But she did it too well. I only wish I knew what she was up to."

"A double cross?"

"Exactly, Ace," smiled the Doctor, touching his finger to her nose.

"Sometimes I just don't get you, Professor."

***

Back on Tetrapbyria the Rani confronted Vitreum, who stood about the samples, miserable. She asked,"Do you pledge your loyalty to my cause, Vitreum?"

"Yes, Rani," said the Mantissan flatly. "I have no choice. I'd rather die a scientist than an experimental subject."

"Be sure. I demand obedience. Failure has a high price."

"I will not fail."

"Good. Then we will proceed with schedule."

"Yes. But I was thinking, that the Doctor will try to come back for me, despite what he says. Callom can be very persuasive."

"Even after you rejected him?" the Rani asked, amused.

"He's foolishly loyal. A trait all humans possess. He'd lay his life down for mine."

"Pathetically human."

"Yes. I was thinking that you should put the Doctor out of action, permanently."

"Really?" asked the Rani.

"After all, he could ruin any other number of your experiments."

"What do you have in mind?" she asked.

"I was thinking your genius could come up with an appropriate end. And still get data."

"To tell you the truth, there is an experiment I've been meaning to try. The effects of Time Wind exposure to biological material. Here is where you will prove your loyalty to me, Vitreum."

"Me?" asked Vitreum.

"Yes. You will take your craft, loaded with a special device of mine, into the Vortex. There you will detonate a certain sequence."

"What is the theoretical principal behind this, Mistress?" asked Vitreum.

"You will track the TARDIS through its telepathic circuits. Then materialize near him in space-time. Jettison this canister," said the Rani, reaching for a small cylander on a lab bench nearby. She handed it to Vitreum, who looked at it with question.

"What does it contain?"

"It operates on the same principal as a tumor. It feeds off a TARDIS's force field. Then a second device sets off a chain reaction in time space, creating a Time Wind."

"A Time Wind," gasped Vitreum. "That could destroy the structural integrity of the TARDIS relative dimensions."

"Exactly. And as the ship compresses, the life forms inside do not. Either they will die from the penetration of the chronion particles bombarding their bodies, or they will be crushed," said the Rani.

"What's to stop me from being affected as well?" asked Vitreum.

"I have taken the liberty of coating your TARDIS with a neutralizing agent. You will have five minutes of rell time to escape the Time Wind."

"When do I start?" she asked eagerly.

"There's no time like the present."

***

After having shown Raina a guest room, and helped her to lay down, Callom sat on his bed, absently fiddling on a violin. He'd just spent hours wandering in the corridors of the TARDIS, checking rooms absently. He was glad that Raina was alive and well, and he almost wished he could collapse into sleep like she did. In some rooms were long forgotten treasures. Including a whole room of various musical instruments. In a case, lovingly preserved, he found the violin. Rosin still filled a small metal canister. With nothing better to do, Callom rosined the bow, and plucked a few strings. Sweet notes filled the old chamber.

Carrying the violin, he made his way back to the room assigned to him. He spent hours playing scales, up and down. His nimble fingers caressed the ancient strings with a passion that would not be denied. Chords and runs gave way to abstract expressions of the conflicting emotions storming through his heart and soul.

Ace heard the sweet music echoing down the corridor. She was on her way to the chemistry lab to cook up more explosives. Vivaldi's four seasons rippled in massive choking waves to touch her. Not up much on classical music, she wondered what the piece was. And who was playing it.

Opening the door softly, she saw the young Scot standing. He rested one foot on a stool, violin tucked beneath his chin. Firm young fingers pressed strings like a master. He was oblivious to her presence, as his mind was consumed by his music making.

Sure, he was a telepath. But the Doctor said he wasn't the best at discerning thoughts. Except for human thoughts and visual images from humanoid species. He stopped, and looked at the door.

"Is that you, Ace?" he asked.

"Sorry to bug you, squirt," she apologized. 

"Come on in, or go away," he said, lowering his violin and bow.

Ace entered. She wore a loose white blouse and biker tights. Her hair was pulled back in a French braid. Small earrings dangled from one ear, out of balance with the hoops in the left.

Her full lips pressed close together. For an awkward moment she stood just inside the doorway, not sure of what to do next. "I'm not really good a psychiatry, or anything, but if you like, need to talk or something..."

"Yuid be happy to listen. Verra well. I guess I do need someone."

Fidgeting, she sat on the bed. Already Callom had placed some personal touches in the room. A tartan swath was draped on the bed. His bonnet was hung over the end of a chair. Several classical books were piled on a beside table from the TARDIS collection of books.

"I jest canna believe that she'd mean all that," he sighed.

"Grown ups say weird things sometimes," Ace said.

"I thought she loved me. I refuse to believe she doesn't."

"Angry people say things they don't mean. At least I think they do."

"She's like, a parent or something," said Callom. He sat down on the bed next to her.

"I don't need any parents," said Ace hastily, then stopped herself. "At least not any mum or dad."

"My da never really cared if I was there or not," Callom admitted.

"Was there, anyone else that took care of you""

"There was Ms. Fergussen, mah nanny. She was also the housekeeper. And ma uncle Andrew. He was nuts about me. Tha's where ma middle name comes from."

"Cool."

"And then there was Dr. MacLaren from the states. She was visiting the Loch when she was studying geology there. And then Vitreum showed up and said she was a psychic teacher. Did ye ken she was the first person who said tha I cuild do whatever I wanted when I grew up? Tha I didnae have to be what my Father thought" Anything I chose was okay."

"She really means that much to you, doesn't she?" asked Ace.

"Aye. Raina and I were captured and both brought here to the Rani's zoo together. Vitreum betrayed us, because she was collecting specimins for the Rani. Still she tried to save us, but then she rejected us back there. Tha's why I hurt. Does everyone I love hurt me so."

Ace sniffed back tears. "No way, kid. Don't you believe that rubbish for a second!"

"I don't know what to believe, nau."

"Come here, Callom. You look like you seriously need a hug."

Ace held out her arms. Callom leaned against her, and they held each other for a long time. Two lonely children seeking comfort in their common histories.

The TARDIS and its occupants hurtled through the endless Vortex.

"Ye say that the Doctor thinks Vitreum was lying?" asked Callom.

"He said she was trying to get you to be angry with her, so you'd leave more easily. Make you hate her."

"That didna work too well."

"I know. That's what was fishy. He's seen lots of people, and lots of behavior. When he does pay attention that is."

***

Slowly the Doctor stirred a cup of tea. Darjeeling steamed hot inside the ancient china cup with matching service. He gotten it long ago during the reign of Queen Victoria.

Tentatively he nibbled a digestive biscuit. Dunked it once or twice before slipping it into his mouth once more. It had taken him forever to program the food machine to get them right. Still, once in a while he'd tiptoe down to the food stores and dust off an old can of Walker's Scottish shortbread. He lay in a good supply the last time he'd touched down on Earth, the same place he'd obtained the Darjeeling. Few things perished in the TARDIS, outside of time and space.

He sat down in the Louis XV chair, propping his feet on an ancient hassock. Took cup and saucer in hand, and sipped. Each time he took tea, he dimmed the lights in the TARDIS lounge. 

For one blissful moment he let himself slip away. Let his mind rest on the throbbing pulse from the TARDIS generators. Like a heartbeat steady and strong. 

Something felt very wrong. He set down his cup, frowning. Jumped to his feet and paced. Then rushed out of the room. "Good gracious me, I should have guessed!" he exclaimed, slapping his forehead.

***


	2. A Growing Madness Part 1

* * *

__

A Growing Madness 

Theresa E. Meyers

Written 1996, revised 1998

* * *

PROLOGUE: A SUDDEN CHANGE OF EVENTS 

Screams echoed in the corridors of the Cerise, an Aries class survey ship. Frantically young Lieutenant Dumas raced away from a maddened band of people bent on only one thing: his death! A tear of exhaustion slid down his face as he stopped gasping before a silver grille. The sterile white corridors offered temporary refuge, yet would soon betray his whereabouts. At intervals in the tunnels lay the sleeping forms of many crewmembers. Those who had escaped sleep had become paranoid.

"Commander Morgan! They--they're after me!"

On the multi windowed command deck sat a weary control officer. Her ruffled hair frizzed in a cloud about her drooping head as she grimly listened to the crewmember. Stars slid behind the glass, reflecting across her red rimmed eyes. "Take the secret access tunnel to the command deck." Before she could finish, the commander heard a blood-chilling scream. Sadly she closed her heavy eyelids. Veins bulged under the pale skin covering her hands as she depressed the recording button. 

THIS is the Commander. I fear this will be my last entry. The madness has affected nearly thirty members of my crew . . . ten are dead . . . Untold others have slumped into a feverish sleep. They can't wake! I'm not sure which is worse, facing the mad crowd or falling prey to a nightmarish sleep. All around me is madness . . . 

She continued till her weary head nodded from exhaustion. Glancing at her empty stimulant bottle, she started in fear. No more of the drugs existed to whisk her from the brink of madness. Footsteps mingled with ever louder angry shouts, closer, closer. A dozen fists pounded the steel door behind her. "This, is the end. I take my last stand. One sip away from insanity."

A bottle shattered on the floor, sending a thousand glittering shards of glass to scatter. They mirrored the stars' intensity, and the gleaming madness in the crews glassy eyes . . . 

* * *

PROLOGUE TWO: A SUDDEN CHANGE OF EVENTS 

Fiona Vitreum slid her hands down the crystalline net relays readying the linkage between her computer and the TARDIS' computer. A vital countdown shouted into her ear as she watched the scanner screen for the vortex to flux. All around her shimmered and melted walls, like ice cream on a hot sidewalk. Only millimeters from a panel waved her finger as she waited for the walls of her ship to break down.

Then came the wheezing groan of dematerialization as the STAGE bore the TARDIS. Next came the dematerialization of the square blue TARDIS as it vanished free of its confines. Time winds gushed into the control room shattering the neural crystalline relays into thousands of glittering shards that slowly flew apart. Fiona Vitreum would be swallowed by the void of time-space with little chance to survive.

"We must simply try to stop the time wind penetration," was what the lad last remembered Vitreum saying. Callom clutched his tartan scarf and prayed she'd somehow survive. A hand came to rest on his shoulder as the geologist, Dr. Raina MacLaren crossed over to him.

"She wasn't a traitor after all," Raina muttered. "Damn…"

"That's one brave bird," muttered the teenager standing next to the short fellow she called the Professor.

"A foolish child," grumbled the Doctor. "She just had to be the one to jettison the room form mechanism on her STAGE to release mine."

"Take care of Callom, please," Vitreum begged them.

"You can be assured of that," the Doctor nodded.

"He'll be okay, but what about you? Do you have to play the goddamned martyr?" Raina shouted. 

"Please… you must trust me!" Fiona shouted just before she swung her cloak round her quilted jacket shoulders. Into the glittering splendor of her time machine's control room she'd vanished.

"Even if she did survive and find a time lane to transit to, she couldn't withstand contact with the Vortex," finished the Doctor sadly. 

"What if the Rani got her an instant before that break down, Professor?" asked Ace. "She'd be much better off dead, Ace." 

"How canna ye say such a thing?" wailed Callom. 

"I know the Rani. She uses captives for the most morbid experiments, said the Doctor gently stroking Callom's fair-haired head. "I'm sorry, lad."

"Doctor, do you have to state the damn obvious?" Raina rolled her eyes. "The poor kid's traumatized enough!"

All seemed so still and heavy to Callom as he buried his young face in the Doctor's brown felt jacket. It was to this strange pair he turned for a shred of comfort. On the scanner screen played the horrid events again. A loud muffled groan from the TARDIS as it broke free of Vitreum's STAGE and hurtled into a safer part of the Vortex. 

(Space Time Analogue Jaunt Enabler)

Yet as he reached to feel the aching loneliness existing after her death, he felt nothing. Not even the absence of her presence in his mind. "Doctor . . . when a friend of a telepath dies, is there a feeling of emptiness?"

"There is yes, for your mind becomes accustomed to sensing their thoughts. You, being of a telepathic species, have formed a bond with Vitreum."

"And ye Time Lords are also telepathic."

"Mildly so, yes."

"Then ye can sense Vitreum's thoughts almost as well as I ken?"

"Not as strongly no... what is your point?"

"When I reach out to find the emptiness I should feel," began Callom, shutting his eyes for a moment. "I feel nothing. If ye try-- dinna ye notice it's rather full of a nothing . . . not a void or a fullness . . . jest a nothing."

The Doctor stared into a metaphysical dimension. "Nothing comes from nothing. Not emptiness or a void. Yet in every myth, there is nothing before something. But that's in creation mythology. . . " 

"What are you babbling about, Professor?" snapped Ace. "Callom's friend is dying, and you're . . . "

"He's making sense to me, and I have no clue what he's talking about," the geologist admitted.

"Pardon me while I'm having a strange metaphysical interlude," he hissed. "Anyway, that Descartes was not quite so accurate when he said 'nothing comes from nothing.' At least not in the case of psychic sensing death. A void means the absence of something, which, since we can label and discern it, it is at least something."

"But a void is emptiness. And something empty has nothing," argued Ace.

"But you can fill a void," Raina muttered. "Is that where you're going with this?"

"Exactly, Professor!" the Doctor clapped, slapping her on the back with glee that she'd grasped it. "Nothing cannot be filled with something and still be nothing . . . " countered the Doctor, his voice raised to a strong shout. Hurriedly he swung round the console. "And that means there is still hope!"

"What on Earth is he on about?" asked Callom.

"It's one of his crazy spells, explained Ace throwing up her hands in resignation.

"Oh wait!" he exclaimed, suddenly realizing what the Doctor meant. "The Doctor said something about what nothing was . . . so if I felt nothing that didn't mean I felt emptiness. That means . . . "

An abbreviated wheeze groaned as the TARDIS dematerialized in some part of the Vortex. In pure wonder Ace and Callom gazed at the scanner. Hurtling across the undulating Vortex was a small opaque chamber that seemed lit from inside.

"What's that?"

"Now what was the program for adding rooms to the TARDIS configuration?" asked the Doctor of himself.

"Nau I feel something!" cried Callom excitedly. "But its verra faint."

"Ace, when I tell you to, open the TARDIS doors . . . " ordered the Doctor, both his hands flying across a pad of typewriter keys. Ace stood by the switch and readied herself. 

All three Time Travelers gripped the console as the TARDIS shook from collision with an outside body. "Now!" shouted the Doctor. The doors swung open.

Out though the double doors the trio saw a dimming room. It was none other than the console room from the STAGE! Wearily into the TARDIS console room stumbled a figure clad in tattered clothing. 

"Vitreum!" cried Callom, as he raced toward her.

"Stay back," Vitreum cautioned. "There may still be . . . radiation . . . "

"Holy crap," Raina muttered, shaking her head. She moved first, and grasped the figure that pitched into her arms.

"You're safe in here no matter what," said the Doctor, stepping forwards. "Close the doors, Ace."

"What happened?" begged Callom.

"Damn, you look wasted, easy now…" Raina urged, helping the Genomyn to lay down carefully.

"You saved us from death and disaster," congratulated the Doctor softly. "Though not necessarily in that order."

Vitreum smiled a pale smile, only a mere shadow of her old self. Indeed her whole body seemed a mere phantasm as she stumbled further onto the flight deck. Her hair was streaked with white, as if with age, and her eyes were glazed embers with dark circles under them. "Callom . . . we are safe?"

"Yes, ye saved us all!" he gulped down, trying to mask his fear.

"What the hell did you do?" demanded Ace, but before Vitreum could answer, she collapsed into Raina's arms. The geologist lowered her to the floor as the other three rushed to her, falling on their knees round her. The Doctor felt the pulse in her neck, as Raina pulled off her vest and shoved it under the scientist's neck. Callom turned her head so she could look sideways at them. "Hai-Callom," she breathed, smiling weakly at him. "So worried about me. Didn't I tell you, that this might happen?"

"She's dying," muttered Ace, laying a hand on Callom's shoulder. She knelt on one knee behind the lad as he propped Vitreum's head on Raina's knees.

"It's all right Vitreum," said the Doctor softly. "You don't have to fight it now. Just let it happen naturally."

"Please, don' leave me," sobbed Callom, sniffling at the tears rolling down his pale young cheeks.

"I will never leave you . . . " stammered Vitreum, looking up at him. "I promised to get you to Scotland . . . oh, Doctor . . . can you please?"

"Of course," nodded the Doctor, holding her hand. "Prof. Mariner, Ace and I will take care of him."

Rolling her eyes up to Callom, Vitreum blinked a small smile into existence. "Don't pine over me . . . or grieve," she whispered. 

"I'm na crying... at least not now," he whispered.

"Professor… please… if you go back to Earth… take care… take care of him…" Vitreum looked to Raina.

"Whatever you say… look, I said that you were a coward before, but I was wrong… I take that back…"

"Your words, helped me se reason…" she laughed. "Not bad… for a primitive…"

"Oh shut up," Raina urged. "Save your strength…"

"All things come . . . to their lowest energy state . . . that's entropy that is. The cycle continues . . . life from non life . . . "

At those words, her voice failed her, and she lay very still. Her head dropped limply into Raina's lap. At once he felt the emptiness flooding his mind that he'd dreaded for so long.

The teenager helped the geologist to move Vitreum's head and shoulders off of Raina's knees. Pulling out a handkerchief, Raina removed the scientist's glasses and lay the cloth over her face. "She really was with us in the end, bless her," she muttered. "If only there had been another way…"

"She redeemed whatever evil she did with the Rani," the Doctor said slowly.

"What the hell good does it do us now Professor," countered Ace. She slid her arm around Callom's back as he cried softly to himself. He buried his face against her young chest. Raina lay her hand on Callom's shoulder, gripping it tightly.

"None, I'm afraid," the Doctor sighed. 

"We need to give her a proper burial…" Raina whispered. 

"Of course…" the Doctor whispered. Just then, a strange noise made them jump back from the fallen body. A flare of energy surged brightly from Fiona's body, and slammed into them all. The Doctor pulled Callom back as Raina threw Ace out of the way. Something spread quickly over Fiona's body in seconds.

"Get back!" the Doctor cried. "The radiation…"

Raina shrieked as the second lash slammed into her, knocking her back as the body suddenly imploded. She lay alongside of a pile of ashes, completely still.

"Doctor what…" Ace got out.

"Quickly, we haven't much time! That was one of the Rani's boobytraps… a last flare of temporal radiation. We have got to get her down to the lab…"

"What do you mean…" Callom wailed.

"If we touch her would we be affected?" Ace asked.

"Wait…" the Doctor muttered, and rushed over to the console. He punched buttons and ran fingers down relays. There was a faint series of clicks that died into nothing. It sounded like an old fashioned Gieger counter.

"She's free of the time wind radiation. This is extraordinary," the Doctor muttered, moving over to Raina.

"Is she all right or not?" Ace demanded, wanting to move close, but holding Callom back.

"Yes… the TARDIS reads no more radiation. But that blast should have killed a human… I wonder… Callom, didn't you say that the Rani had done experiments on all of the subjects?"

"Yes… she gave me telepathic powers…"

"Presumably she must have experimented on Dr. Mariner as well. But what sinister machinations did she make… I wonder… quick, help me Ace… Callom…"

"What can we do?"

"An anti radiation drug might bring her out of it. Come along now… careful," the Doctor directed them. The three lifted the sturdy geologist in their arms and carried her into the bowels of the TARDIS. 

***

PART ONE: RECUPERATION 

She'd awakened to soft light and silence, except the distant humming of some powerful generator. Someone's shadow had handed her a squeeze bottle of water to wet her lips. Then she'd slipped under again.

Only to shake off sleep and sit boldly upright. Surprised that she was breathing, that the triple beat of her pulmonary system delivered blood to all parts of her body. Small hands rubbed at encrusted eyes, and everything was blurry.

Of course. The eyes were always a problem. She was allergic to chemicals capable of curing the deficiency. Hence the solution of glasses, a primitive yet effective sight correction. Fuzzy shadows and lights formed themselves into a watercolor rendering of a room. The brown square mass off in the distance must be a chair. A rounded blob right before her eyes was the tip of her nose. Something soft fell into her eyes. Feeling its stringy soft texture she realized it must be hair. But was her hair so long?

"Just how long was I asleep," she wondered without speaking.

But she shouldn't be here. Shouldn't she be at the base camp, at the foot of the mountain? At Mt. St. Helens in Washington state, on Earth. With the other geologists.

Geologists? Since when was she at Mt. St. Helens? Or at any volcano?

Again, she looked down at the hands. They felt too small. Somehow, the fingers were much shorter in proportion to the palms. She wondered if there had been some corrective surgery done. Seeing any sign of sutures was not usual, many civilizations could use lasers or skin grafting enzymes to promote healing.

She struggled out of the covers. The bed felt like a sleeping bag tossed over a form-fitting couch supporting back and knees. Hard floor rose up from underneath her and knocked the wind from her peripheral lungs. Hard cold floor that was glassy smooth. All around her fell long brown strands.

The woman took a length of the strands in her hand and stared at the tips. It was long enough to fall well below her shoulders. She looked down at hands pressed against the floor. Small hands. Looked down at large breasts and thighs curving beneath the loose garment sheathing her body. Small hands felt sloping shoulders and wide hips, soft living hair. Eyes looked at feet that were wide and short toed. Humanoid feet and fingers, four to each hand with an opposable thumb. Much like it should be. Fudge brown hair swept over her shoulders. Hair was something programmed for appearance's sake. Funny, because she could swear she had died. Yet, she could feel the solidness of the body, and the weight of the bones. Again she pushed against a floor and swayed to stand.

"I'm alive…" Dr. Mariner gasped, shaking her head. "I'm actually alive…"

Beneath her, the floor rocked from side to side, and only the wall could stop her from falling. "Here! You shouldn't be out of bed, girl!"

"What . . . "

Rolling along the wall, she faced the speaker. A figure with pink fleshy features atop black and multicolored blobs. Quickly it came into focus as it approached her. Inches away the blob became the face and shoulders of a young female human. Her eyes registered the human emotion of concern blended with pique.

"You only just came out of it . . . lie down . . . c'mon . . . "

Hands took her arms and guided her to the bed. The woman took faltering steps, tripping over her own small feet.

"I shouldn't be here . . . they need me at the camp . . . "

"What the 'ell are you babbling on about? You gave us all a nasty fright. Come on and lay down . . . "

"I don't know who you are, or where I am, but I need to get out of here and back to the base camp. There's going to be an eruption any day . . . "

"Take it easy…" 

She let the girl sit her down. "Where am I?"

"In the TARDIS. Don't you remember? You almost bought it . . . "

"I don't get it. Who are you?"

"I'm Ace. You've had a nasty accident, and you're just recovering. You need to rest . . . or you'll never get over it."

"Rest… why? I haven't got time to rest. There's so much to do . . . "

"What are you talking about? Don't you remember anything?"

"What am I supposed to remember?"

Ace spun some story of a fantastic adventure. The woman didn't match any of it with her memory. 

"That's not right," insisted the woman. 

"The Doctor gave you an anti radiation drug. Whatever hit Fiona Vitreum copped you, and then you passed out…"

"Fiona Vitreum?" Raina asked slowly. "Who the hell is that?"

"Don't you remember anything?"

"This place… where are we?" Raina demanded, glancing around the room. "Some sort of lab.. or building…"

"We're in the TARDIS… traveling through time and space…"

"I've been abducted… no way," Raina muttered. "It's impossible…"

"Dr. MacLaren, you have got to remember! You and Callom were abducted by the Rani! To use as specimens in her latest experiment!"

Callom, Rani. The name exploded images out of the nothingness. At last she remembered before the pain. Or at least pieces began to fall into a coherent plot line.

"Callom! Is that kid okay? What happened to him?"

"He's fine. Now just take it easy . . . "

"Did the Rani get to him?" she demanded, eyes wide with horror. Ace felt the woman's small hand clamping on her upper arm with amazing strength.

"Here now, stop that!" 

"I must know! I'm responsible for him! Fiona said so…"

Urgency shivered through the woman's arm and viselike grip. It was clear that the mention of Callom had temporarily jogged her memory. Best to take advantage of this new development, the teenager thought. "He . . . he's helping the Doctor now. He was really scared to death . . . but he's coming through well."

Ace raced to keep up with her. Down the maze of corridors she stumbled blindly after the geologist. Despite her hazy mind, this woman possessed incredible endurance. For what seemed like hours she explored the winding corridors of the TARDIS with a halting, yet measured pace. A pace she deliberately used to mark the distance traveled.

At last Ace caught up to the geologist. Dr. MacLaren stood inside a vast chamber filled with clothing racks. Hands groped at various garments as they held up shirts and cloaks. 

"Where the hell are my clothes?" she asked Ace, pooling through the wardrobes.

"We had to destroy them, in case they were polluted. But if you want to, the Professor's got all sorts of stuff to chose from…"

"Good. I'll have to talk to this Professor about this abduction… and how he can take me home. I'm right in the middle of a geological survey," she muttered. Now she held a frilly shirt up to herself and looked. Shook her head. Turned to the other racks.

"Nothing to wear, eh, Yank?" Ace said. "Here… try this."

"All these clothes… so many different time periods. I could swear it's like being in a museum…"

"C'mon… we'll find you something, Yank," Ace promised, and led her over to another wardrobe. 

"Any bras maybe?" she asked hopefully. "I had a backpack with me…"

"Trust me to forget," Ace laughed. "Here… he left it in your room. C'mon I'll take you back there and you can get dressed."

Hand to her forehead, she sank toward the floor. Ace ran to catch her as she crumpled, but was knocked off balance by the woman's greater body weight. So she guided her to a prone position.

Dark eyes fluttered open after a half-minute. Squinted up at Ace. Then the seventies geologist from UCLA Berkely sat bold upright. "I passed out, right?"

"Got that right. Are you okay?"

"Now I am…" she groaned. "Damn, hell of a place to get a migraine…"

"C'mon let's get you back to your room," Ace said, helping Raina with an arm around her shoulders.

***

PART Two: INTERRUPTED JOURNEYS 

Hurtling through the Vortex where Space and Time combined was an odd craft indeed. With its erratic steering, the vessel always ended up in the last place any of them expected. From the outside, it resembled a square blue 1950s Police Box. Yet its inner dimensions far exceeded its outward appearance.

Inside a sterile gleaming control room stood two Time Travelers. The first one bent over a six-sided console calmly flipping switches. He stared intently at the information screen before him. This traveler, with countless adventures behind him, was called the Doctor. In his most recent incarnation, this shorter version had age and experience on his side. "Seems there's a bit of flux in the xR-370 section of the Vortex," he muttered, straightening up. Across his sweater was knitted a pattern of question marks and zigzags.

"Does tha mean trouble, Doctor?" asked Callom MacLaren, the other traveler in the room. He moved nervously toward the wall.

"Youngsters," thought the Doctor. "Always worrying about the littlest things." Chuckling to himself, the Doctor remembered how this lad always found his worst fears were completely unfounded. 

Suddenly, a jolt shook the TARDIS. "What was that?" gasped Callom, steadying himself by clinging to the Louis XIV chair.

"Simply a bit of time turbulence, my lad," reassured the Doctor. "Nothing to worry yourself about."

A teen-aged girl wearing a denim skirt over black leggings and a Sonic Youth T-shirt emerged from the corridors. "Ah, Ace. How's our patient faring?" 

"She was pretty flaky for a while, Doctor, but she's acting pretty normal now."

"So she's up and about, I can safely assume."

"You wouldn't think she was laying stiff on her back a few hours ago . . . " began Ace, but stopped when the Doctor threw her a sharp glance. 

"Sorry, kid," she apologized. "I was forgetting you were up here."

Callom shrugged and pulled down his sweater over his waist again. The son of a twentieth century Scottish laird, Callom wore the traditional tartan of his clan MacLaren. Only recently had he come to travel with the Doctor and Ace. Bravely the fair haired young Scot smiled at the Doctor. "It's okay. Jest as long as she's all right, nothing bothers me for long."

"Where are we headed Professor?" Ace asked him, trying to change the subject.

"A little vacation planet I learned about the last time I was at Maruthia . . . "

"The last time you and I were there, there was that big bust up. At Bonjaxx's," snorted Ace. "I wasn't sure we'd get outta there with our skins on."

"I was assured that this planet . . . well was a prime spot. And what our patient needs now is a neutral environment."

"Somewhere neutral? She should have gone to Perivale." 

"Where's Perivale?" asked Callom.

"Ace's hometown," said the Doctor. "According to Ace, it's right in the middle of nowhere."

"Jest make certain it's a peaceful place enau . . . " 

"I'll try, Callom. I used to have a Zero Room on the TARDIS. Normally that's the perfect neutral environment for a regenerated Time Lord. But I had to jettison it for thrust a long time ago."

"That the same time you jettisoned the pool, Doctor?"

"Ace, I already told you I have no control over what piece of the TARDIS is detached when I do that . . . "

Another shock sent them all grabbing for the nearest object. The resulting shudder threw Callom into the chair, and sent Ace flying into the far wall. Naturally the Doctor gripped the TARDIS console. "Feels like something jest fell off yuir TARDIS nau . . . " 

"That's impossible . . . Callom . . . "

Again the room vibrated. Through the door stumbled a stocky, dark-haired woman clutching the doorframe for support. A red vest with multiple pockets hung from her broad shoulders. "I know this isn't an active fault zone, Doctor, " she said conversationally. "But you didn't tell me you'd need a seismograph . . . "

"Dr. MacLaren!" laughed Callom, running to her. "I'm so glad yuir awake again!" Momentarily, he hesitated flinging his arms around her. From past experience, he feared she'd reprimand him for making a scene.

"Uh… hi…" Raina said, surprised at getting a firm hug around her waist. "Nice to see you're okay too, kid." 

Delighted, he wrapped his arms around her neck and hugged her hard in a choke hold that would have strangled an ordinary human "Nau everything's gonna be okay!"

"I certainly hope so," she laughed, holding him apart from her. "But ease up on the bear hug before you crush a few ribs…"

"Wonderful to see you up and about . . . " smiled the Doctor, walking over to them. "You had me worried Dr. MacLaren."

"What's wrong, Doctor? Why did I get sick and lose my memory! Ace told me that I had radiation poisoning…"

Scratching his head, the Doctor looked sheepish. "To tell you the truth… yes. But the effects seem to have worn off due to the anti radiation drug."

Ace was glad they'd found something for the geologist to wear. Certainly she dressed differently than before, with her green coveralls and puffy sleeved blouse. That red vest looked just like the sort a hiker or a fisherman would wear, with its dozens of pockets of assorted sizes. All that was familiar was the segmented headband fastened around the crown of her scalp, keeping her fudge brown shoulder-length hair out of her face. 

"Another modern convenience in this space ship, right?" she laughed. A nice hearty laugh, thought the Doctor. Still she kept an arm around Callom. As fellow prisoners, she had taken charge of him, and he had been drawn to her as a source of strength when they were in the Rani's clutches. Momentarily, the lights in the TARDIS went off. 

"Professor!" Ace snapped. "What in blue blazes happened to the lights?"

There was a thump and a grunt. "How should I know?"

"Well don't you have a power gauge or something?"

"I did, but the readout light is on the blink . . . "

All was plunged into darkness, save some lights flickering on the TARDIS console. Raina moved away from Callom. "What's going on?" he whispered to her.

"Wait there a moment, kid."

She groped her way to the console panel, where one light had caught her eye. "Hey Doctor," she said. "This warning message on the visual scanner panel. I think there's something outside you should see . . . "

"What?"

"The scanner's detecting a strange cloud of particles congealing on the TARDIS's exterior!"

Quickly the Doctor switched on the screen. As a panel in the roundelled wall slid down, all four stared in amazement at a shimmering cloud flickering against the background of stars. "Hyperbolic," muttered Ace, standing transfixed. 

"How did we dematerialize out in space without me knowing?" demanded the Doctor. "Better not be the High Council asking me to do their dirty work for them again!"

"I didn't hear the remote control mechanism," said Ace.

"But the coordinates read outer space," puzzled the Doctor. The shimmering lights cast a flickering multicolored display, playing off the walls and faces of the crew. "Callom! Get on the Fault Locator," shouted the Doctor through a high-pitched wailing that had started. Just as the youth stumbled his way to the bank of computers, the lights blinked back on.

"Och! Nae need for that nau," muttered the boy irritably.

Sparkling vapor penetrated the walls and seeped into the room. Raina leapt back in surprise. Ace and Callom scattered, alarmed. 

"How'd it get in here?" Raina wondered, finger pushing her glasses further along the bridge of her upturned nose.

"Most interesting," observed the Doctor. "The momentary blackout temporarily let down the force-field, deshielding the TARDIS's temporal stability..."

"I don't care how the flamin' thing got in here!" yelled Ace. "What the 'eck is it?"

"Doctor! It's headed toward the console!" 

"Eh, Callom?" grunted the Doctor, intently studying a panel on the console. Shimmering, it hovered closer to the six-sided console, and the oblivious Doctor. Bewildered, he glanced up as all the shimmering particles in the cloud's heart pressed together, and leapt directly into the power core. There was a flash, and a bang. The Doctor was thrown back. Ace rushed to help the Doctor to his feet. A third jolt flung her toward where Callom stood. Dizzily, the TARDIS whirled about like a crazy merry-go-round. Its passengers pressed close to the walls form the intense centrifugal force. Whining pulsed to a drone, beating the air about them. "Ace! This is a real thrill!" exclaimed the young twentieth century teenager.

"This . . . isn't supposed . . . to be . . . happening!" grunted the Doctor, pressed flat to the roundelled wall. He struggled to pull free by pressing the flats of his palms against the sides of the chamber. 

"No joke, Dick Tracy!" shouted Raina, over the rising roar of the rotation. "I feel like a slab of wall paper! Get us away from here."

The droning vibrated the spinning chamber, growing steadily in volume and intensity. It drilled into Callom and Ace's brains. "What's . . . happening?" moaned Callom, sick from the motion.

"Disruption. Of the temporal . . . continuum!" gasped the Doctor. "Something's causing ripples . . . in our path!" At last he managed to break free of the wall. Moving painfully in slow motion, he approached the console. He stretched out his arms, fingers only inches from the console. Pressure forced in from all sides to halt his progress.

"It cannae be that Time Wind again, can it?" groaned Callom.

"No! We would have been fizzled away by now!" shouted Raina. "It's something else!"

"Don't think I like this anymore," mumbled Ace feebly. Head tipped to the side, she could barely stay awake. The pressure and droning bombarded her skull relentlessly. Beside her, young Callom moaned. Both slipped in and out of consciousness. Pinned to the wall, neither he nor Ace could have the sweet relief of a horizontal faint. The incessant droning filled their minds, suspending them between blackout and alertness.

The Doctor strained intense mental vibrations to disrupt the time storm. HE swept out with her thoughts, focusing his mind on the one particular lever that would end the misery. Gritting against the droning pulsation dominating his mind, he pried himself loose from the wall. Somehow he fought against the force, driving it back with his mind. Reached out his arm, throwing himself forwards to grab the levers. Just a few millimeters took enormous strength.

Relief resounded in the wheezing groan of dematerialization. Emergency materialization jarred the TARDIS, flinging the passengers to the flight deck. All lapsed into blissful nothingness. A sound, like a dozen elephants trumpeting, reverberated the corridors of a space ship. The oblong, blue shape of a London Police Box blinked in and out of existence battling to become solid.

***

Darkness was blissful. That is until Raina felt the brazen lump in her head. A cool soothing moisture sponged her forehead gently, loosening the hardness. Muscles in her face loosening, her dark lashed eyelids blinked open. Someone's blurred head and shoulders huddled over her. A hand replaced her glasses. Once her eyes focused in on her surroundings, Raina recognized the face of the Doctor, hovering concernedly over her. He moistened his red handkerchief in a glass of water. The shadow of his arm passed over her sight. She felt the same soothing, cool sensation helping to bring her round. "H-how is everyone?" she stammered. "I would first inquire how you feel," answered the Doctor, raising one eyebrow. With his ironic correction, he smiled at her. The expression was contagious, for even the dizzy Raina managed to smile weakly in response. Slowly she took deep breaths to clear her mind. All of a sudden, she gasped, "Wait! Callom and Ace!" She pushed against the floor, struggling to sit up. "Doctor! Is Callom okay?" 

"Not to worry," reassured the Doctor, firmly restraining her with one hand. "Relax. Breaking through that force requires a considerable amount of energy from anyone."

"What did you do? Something about you being a time lord?"

"If you like. Steady on, you've only just recovered from a terrible genetic experiment by the Rani. You're still bound to be shaken up a trifle."

"Wish I could sit up. At least I could help them . . . "

Supporting her shoulders with one arm, the Doctor helped her to sit. "Easy now, take a drink of this."

Raina drank some water from the plastic glass he offered her. "Our young friends are taking a well-deserved rest," he indicated with a wave of his hand.

Looking past his shoulder, Raina saw Ace and Callom, laying flat upon the floor. Both had pillows slipped under their heads and space blankets covering their figures. "Poor kids," muttered Raina. "They're sure out of it."

"Occurred to me it was wise not to move them, or rouse them yet."

"That blasted droning was enough to cause a dozen headaches . . . "

"Quite," agreed the Doctor, gingerly rubbing the back of his scalp. "I'm inclined to agree."

With more sips of water, Raina began to feel her usual self. "Think I'll try standing now," she told the Doctor. Grasping her hands, the Time Lord pulled her to her feet. He stumbled over to the TARDIS console.

"We've materialized," said the Doctor, glancing over several of the indicators. On one of the panels, he noticed several damaged controls, and smelled the stench of smoldering circuits. "Could you be so kind as to check the Fault Locator, Raina."

"Several of the principal mains are blown, Doctor. Whatever that cloud was, it fizzled a lot of your directional controls. Or at least what this thing says…"

"In for a spot of repair work, I see," sighed the Doctor, running his fingers through his dark hair. "The navigation relays are shot."

With a rustle of blankets, Callom began to stir. Raina shuffled over to him and supported his head upon her knees. "Rise and shine, Kid," she whispered, and to her relief his fair lashed eyes soon opened.

*You need not be so worried about me, nau, he transmitted, telepathically. She realized his fear, and sighed.

"But you are my responsibility, Callom, she returned, face grim and serious, forming her thoughts into words he could pick up, as she had learned to do in their prison in the Rani's menagerie. *I can't help but be concerned for you. _ Since we are from the same planet and time…_

"Ahem," coughed someone dryly. Looking up, Callom and Raina saw the Doctor looking toward them from the console. Callom glanced at her and they both smiled. Somehow the Doctor was a bit uncomfortable when he couldn't hear conversations aboard TARDIS.

"Oh, my head . . . " moaned Ace, stirring from beneath her blanket. 

"Callom . . . would you be so kind as to fetch some water and tend to Ace now?"

"Jest a minute . . . " "Don't worry Callom," said Raina. "I'll go."

Callom sat down on the Louis XIV chair and watched the Doctor work. On his back with his face buried into the console he banged and clattered with the TARDIS workings. Occasionally he'd mutter something, and his black and white shoes would twitch out his frustration. He looked like a mechanic tucked under a car.

Gently Raina offered water to the teenager Ace. "Here . . . take all you want. Relax . . . " she soothed, supporting Ace's head and shoulders on one arm.

"A turnabout's fair play, eh?' she smiled weakly to Raina. 

"What's with the Doctor?"

"That phenomenon blew a few relays, I guess," she explained, nodding over her shoulder. "Doctor's just patching her back together . . . "

"It figures, right enough. He's always fixing something . . . "

"He says it's the navigational control," Raina shrugged, not sure of what it meant.

"What else is new? We never know where we're gonna end up, anyway."

"Now since we all seem accounted for, let us see exactly where we seem to have materialized," he said, rising from the floor.

"All fixed, Doctor?" asked Raina.

"As far as I can tell," he replied, wiping his hands on his plaid pants. "Luckily there's a few spares in the emergency units, till I can land somewhere to replace the mains . . ."

"I don't care where we are," said Ace, standing with Raina's help. "As far as you can tell it's fixed? What kinda answer is that?"

"It's the only one I can give you, Ace."

"No way this crazy naff heap is fixed, Professor! I want out!"

"A crazy naff heap?" exclaimed the Doctor reprovingly. "My TARDIS? Just remember who's . . . "

"Relax, Doctor," spoke Raina, moving between them. "We're all cranky because we don't know just what the hell that cloud was."

Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . . seven . . . counted Ace in her mind. Raina could see the tension on the teenager's face as she grasped for self-control. "Shall we take a look on the screen, Professor?" 

"Ah, yes Ace," he replied, his eyebrows lifting upwards in interest. Both his hands rushed over the scanner circuits to check the outside environment readings. "Let's see . . . Atmosphere is 21% oxygen; gravity is four-fifths of earth's; temperature a steady 285 Kelvin. We should be quite comfortable," he muttered.

Two panels on the roundelled wall slid open to reveal the scanner. Onto its screen appeared empty metal corridors. 

"Looks harmless enau," said Callom, standing next to Raina.

"Huh, I'm not so sure," mused the geologist. Slowly she fingered her chin, narrowing her brown eyes behind her thick glasses. Her scientific mind, though trained in 1977 was trying to adapt to this ultramodern environment.

"Come on then," he urged, eyes brightening. "I'd love to see if there are any aliens aboot!"

"You would," quipped Ace. The Doctor walked over to the coat rack. "Agreed then? A little walk around?" he proposed, tossing on a battered straw hat and a brown half-belted coat.

"I'm game for that," said Ace, pulling on her black satin jacket littered with patches and pins. She scooped up her knapsack and slung it over one shoulder.

"You just want to get out of the TARDIS," grinned Raina.

"Well then, let's go, Doctor," goaded Callom. He knotted a tartan scarf around his neck and donned a black coat trimmed with square silver buttons. Raina took a sky-blue cloak from the hat-rack. Rather hesitatingly she attached the cloak to her vest, so it draped neatly over one shoulder. Picking up his umbrella, the Doctor hit the door switch. In the far wall the huge double doors sung open to reveal a hexagonal passage.

Callom looked up at the geologist. He could tell she was putting on a cheerful face for the Doctor. Nevertheless, he sensed Raina was suspicious of the Time Lord. Did she speculate what had really happened after the Rani's plot? Especially since Fiona had given her life to save them?

For a time the corridor meandered. They saw several hatches set at regular intervals down its curves. Strange markings, probably some sort of language, adorned the walls. "Ah, I think this should lead to the flight deck, if I'm not much mistaken."

"Flight deck?" asked Ace. "You mean we're on a ship of some kind?"

"Correct Ace," said the Doctor.

"How do ye ken, Doctor? Tha it is a space ship?"

"Hear that distant pulsing hum, Callom?" said he. "That's the ion power generator." Then he caught sight of a particular pattern of burn marks on the wall, obscuring the writing. "Wait a minute."

"What's the diff between this corridor wall and the next?" demanded Ace impatiently.

"If you like," muttered the Doctor, intently studying the burn marks. "You can go back to the TARDIS for a while. I'll give you my isomorphic key . . . "

"No thanks, I'd rather be bored," muttered Ace. Raina tapped her on the shoulder. 

"Hey Ace. Why don't you go exploring a bit and find out how the ship's laid out?"

"Great idea, Yank," smiled the teenager, her face brightening.

"Take me too," whispered Callom, nudging her elbow.

"Wait a minute," said Raina. Then looking at Ace, she relented. "Okay, but stick with Ace." Callom grinned mischievously. Like most children he loved sneaking away to explore. 

"Okay, Callom," sighed Ace, hand on his shoulder. "Let's move."

She hoisted her backpack onto her shoulder, and set off down the corridor bend. MacLaren tartan swirling around his young knees, the Scot disappeared after her. 

"What have you found, Doctor?" asked Raina, nudging the Doctor on the arm.

"Intriguing how these burn marks follow a regular pattern, don't you think?"

Squinting one eye, Raina examined at the scorched surface. She reached for a gold jeweler's loupe hanging around her neck on a gold chain, and peered at the same area with it. "This alloy happens to be a polymer but it has crystal structure like an alloy . . . "

"Humph, an alloy," muttered the Doctor, uninterested. "Civilization that built this thing didn't know of ceramics."

"Has a low stress factor anyway," stated Raina defensively, tapping the wall with her knuckles. "Something like carbon fibers, but half plastic."

"Did you say plastic?" asked the Doctor, suddenly whirling his head about to stare at her.

"Yep I did," said she, continuing to scrutinize the burned wall through her magnifier. "What civilizations do you know of that would use polymer bonded with some metal to line a spaceship? I mean I'm NOT from this century, but it looks WAY advanced… so I'm guessing it's more then 21st century?"

"Off the top of my memory . . . " mused the Doctor, licking his finger and pressing it to his forehead. "Not many. Barite is found in a few systems not far from Alpha Centauri. Aha!" cried the Doctor, snapping his fingers. "Barite polymers only line the corridors of a ship. Certain models. This is the handiwork of Mars colonists around the year 2230, Earth rel-time."

"Okay, we have a ship, but where's the crew?" wondered Raina. "Unless this craft is a derelict. But if it was, then why's the gravity still operative?"

"I'm puzzled too. Surely they didn't just slip out for a constitutional."

"Something's telling me that it hasn't been abandoned for long." Raina slid her eyes shut for a second, as if listening to something. 

"What's the matter?"

"Just… an overwhelming sense of fear… foreboding… shit I've never felt this before…"

"I know the Rani abducted you, but you must not let the fear overcome you," the Doctor whispered. "That was then and this is now... and you must let it go..."

***

Callom excitedly followed Ace toward a massive hatch. Briefly Ace touched the control panel, and the round portal opened in sections like a dilating camera iris. She restrained Callom with one arm. Lights inside glowed eerily on several bodies scattered on the floor. The same burn marks littered the dim walls. 

"Och, begorra!" whispered Callom. "A tomb?"

"I dunno," whispered Ace, stepping one foot into the room. "Stay behind me, though. Don't know if this lot is sleeping or . . . "

"Don't," pleaded Callom, sick with the mere mention of death. Following Ace, he crept through the array of bodies. The air right inside felt staler. Indeed the picture behind this shutter was grim. As they stood twenty feet in the room, a clanking made Callom freeze.

Whirling about, Ace drew out her baseball bat. "Who's there?" she shouted defiantly. Her bright eyes flicked back and forth wildly as she stalked the room on tense legs. Yet all that had happened was the door behind them clanged shut.

The Scots lad drew in a breath of relief. He dropped beside one of the bodies, one of a young man, and shuddered. Did he dare to search for its pulse? His fingers shakily touched a cold wrist. "Ace," he whispered. "They're all gone. Dead. What wiped them out?"

Striding up to him, she rested a hand on his shoulder. "Don't look at `em all," she advised. "Didn't suffer for long. Look at those burn marks. Probably from laser weapons. Battled it out I guess."

"Why would they want to destroy each other?" he asked staring at her, with wide-eyed childish innocence.

The world wisely teenage regarded him grimly. "People hate each other and go nuts," she answered. "That's why the world still has wars where people blow each other sky high."

"But if they were the entire crew, was this a mutiny then?"

"A mutiny?"

"Och, dinna ye ken about ships 'n the sea?" groaned Callom, rolling his eyes. "Sometimes on long voyages they'rd be a break out of a panic nd' someone would rebel against the captain's word. Tha's mutiny. Ever heard of the Bounty?"

"Never rented that movie," muttered Ace, still on the alert. Her hands tightened on the baseball bat's handle.

***

A deep shudder shook the spacecraft suddenly. Then a strange floating sensation befell the geologist. Literally she drifted in thin air. "Well, Doc," she began. "So much for the artificial gravity. Guess those crew members or whoever they are didn't make things like they should."

"One less problem to weigh us down," quipped the Doctor. Extending his umbrella, he hooked its handle to one of the wall pipes running the length of the corridor. Raina tumbled about playfully as she tried to get accustomed to weightlessness again.

"Do you suppose this ship's on-board system is going kaput?" she asked suddenly.

"Could very well be," the Doctor muttered. Gingerly he edged himself forwards with his fingertips pressing against the wall. "All the more reason to find the command deck."

"The command deck?" asked Raina, curious at his silence. With a single touch of her foot or hand to the corridor walls she followed him. Ahead the Doctor pushed himself to a panel and held up his hand to a panel. Behind the opened door stretched a transparent cylinder ringed with metal sections. 

"This ship's command deck is in the front section. We were in the living quarters."

"I wouldn't know, Doctor, cause I'm not from this century… it's WAY beyond me…"

"This model probably has a nuclear drive unit spaced out from the living bay," guessed the Doctor, pulling himself along the railings to the far wall. Glancing out through the cylinder of stars Raina could glance along the ship horizontally. To her right she saw the rest of the ship stretching its network of bars past a central section. Two spherical units were connected by triple bars to the residential section about one hundred feet back. 

The tube was a connection corridor to the piloting unit up front. Raina suddenly was able to picture what the ship looked like from the outside. Aries class survey ships were built for planetary reconnaissance between short hops. But this ship was modified for sub-space warp transit. Very unusual. Most sub space ships were not girders bolting modules together. Perhaps that's what made this class so popular for exploration? The fact the ship was made in separate units that could be custom latched for an individual expedition. Yet, reasoned the Doctor, Aries class ships had their weaknesses. Clearly they weren't much in a military conflict. They were unable to touch down on a planet's surface, and relied on shuttle units to pull up ground parties. A circular hatch spiraled open to reveal a large flight deck festooned with thousands of computer panels. An arc of windows ringed the place about four feet from the deck.

"Doctor, look at this," muttered Raina, pointing to a slump figure floating over a chair. "A human being I think. She's badly beat up." 

"Good grief," muttered the Doctor, examining her wrists and skin. Fine marks crossed her face, and a dark spot lay about where her heart would be. "Killed by a concussion maser."

"What the hell is that?" Raina shuddered, and pushed away. 

"As I feared, Concussion masers were not used for wartime. Usually they were employed in the blasting away of bedrock when shelters were built on a new colony world," said the Doctor as his hands flew across the control panel next to the victim. "Maybe I can bring up the computer log . . . "

"Doc, I don't think that's wise . . . "

"What's wrong? I thought you'd like to know what's happened . . . "

"But there could be a booby trap . . . if what happened what I think happened, I mean I know I might be from a while before this, but my gut tells me this is like some sort of trap… and we walked into it…"

"Raina, I am quite familiar with this type of ship. From the way she is floating, she was making her last journal entry, and activated the lock file command on her log. There's no booby trap with it. Just a special code."

"Since when did you travel on a ship like this?"

"When I was on my way to the Wheel, 

"Wheel?"

"Space station XL7J883. . . About fifty years ago," he recounted. "Or was it one hundred and fifty years ago? I just can't recall when."

The cursor blinked across the screen as he typed in the log code sequences she could think of. "Aha," he laughed in triumph when the display read "ACCESS GAINED."

Captain's LOG:

SPACESHIP: Cerise, Class Aries Relief/Survey ship

LOCATION: Near Messier Arm 2

DESTINATION: THEILERIA MINOR

"Ring a bell?" Raina asked him.

"Theileria Minor," muttered the Doctor, narrowing his brow. "Now where have I heard that before? Anyway, let's see. Says here that they were transporting a special cargo. To a floundering colony. Some sort of Growth Accelerator . . . "

"Growth Accelerator?" questioned Raina. "Move over a sec . . . "

The Doctor scrolled to another entry. He patiently moved to one side as the Raina read an entry for herself. "Let's see. Unusual cloud of strange lights encountered midway through the voyage . . . "

"I know. Similar to what happened to the TARDIS. Causing power fluctuations . . . Repairs made . . . main star drive disabled." 

"Okay. Suspicion of sabotage when drive continuously failed to malfunction," the Doctor nodded.

"And get this Doctor. Says here that they suspected sabotage when the main drive was blown and someone suggested going to an uncharted area of space. Have you ever heard of this planet, Doctor?"

"What planet . . . "

"That part of the log is partially deleted. I can't make out the name well. Looks like Karr."

"Karr? Never heard of it," muttered the Doctor. "Just as long as it isn't Karn..."

***

Callom kicked off the wall, soaring through the thin air. "Jest try an catch me, lass!" he giggled. 

"Come back here, you little terror . . . " she cried, struggling after him.

Both children soared through a corridor. They'd left the one room far behind to keep its secrets for just a little longer. Callom was practically space-happy. The moment they started floating he'd spun and kicked trying to get his bearings. Straight blonde hair fluffed into a flaxen halo around his head. He looked perfectly at home weightless, despite his soft blue and red wool kilt and home-knit sweater. Sky-blue, golden yellow, and flannel red seemed too gentle and soft against the metallic iron gray of the corridor. Even the tips of his tartan scarf floated spectrally as he drifted.

Ace had felt nauseous. Her braided hair floated. There was no clear sense of up or down. She turned green and tumbled awkwardly, clutching her baseball bat. "How'm I supposed to move?" she groaned, trying to swim over to Callom. "All the ships I was on had gravity."

"This isnae water, Ace," he said. "Ye canna jest thrash about like that. Ye gotta pull yuirself along."

"Fine for you," she muttered. "You're near a railing."

"Take that bat . . . " he said. 

Ace shouldered her bat, and tumbled with the effort. "And?"

"Throw it away from ye as hard as ye can. At the far wall."

"What?"

"Do it."

She tossed her bat away. Then she began to glide slowly across the chamber toward the Scots boy. "Grab ma hand nau. That's it." Callom grabbed hold of her wrist and pulled her effortlessly to the rail where he clung.

"Now how do I get my bat back, smarty?" she asked him.

"Och, yuir niver satisfied," he laughed. "By the way, do ye have some rope or something?"

"Yes. In my backpack here. What's your plan?"

"Tie yon rope to this here railing. Then crawl along the rope to where ye wanna go. Toward the door."

"Fine, squirt. But you're up the creek once you run outta rope. I've only got fifteen feet."

"I'm thinking . . . " he murmured closing his eyes. "If only we had some sort of a pop gun or a crossbow to fire the rope."

"Left my crossbow on the TARDIS."

"Or else a kind of jet . . . "

"A jet?" Ace lit up. "Hold on a sec."

Callom held onto her jacket collar as she wrestled with her backpack. She drew out an aerosol can. "Here's a jet for you, squirt . . . "

"What's that? Yuir nitro-9?"

"No. That's in the bottom. This really is spray deodorant. "

"That'll make a real smell fer sure. But that's pretty guid!"

Using the aerosol cans as hand jets they made their way along the ship. That is after Ace recovered her bat. Soon the smell of hair spray and deodorant filled the musty crew cabins. Callom was the one who found the cargo hold.

"Mebbe if we look in here we can find out what happened to the crew?"

"If we can get the door open," mused Ace, a mischievous smile appearing on her face for a change.

"Could we do it without the flashes and bangs this time?" "You don't think that I would waste this stuff on a mere door, do you, squirt?"

"What do ye have in mind? Some kind of lock-pick? It looks like Captain Kirk's safety deposit box!"

"I know a thing or two about these future space doors. This kinda spacecraft's no battleship. It's just a space cruiser. Hold onto me while I get my kit."

"I'll jest anchors mahsel with the rope."

Callom gripped her jacket as she wrestled something out of her backpack. Around his waist was the rope tied to a nearby railing.

"Y'see most've these doors are magnetically sealed . . . "

"I take it ye ken more than I thought about these doors. Since when were you on this ship?"

"When you get whisked away from your planet and popped into an intergalactic shopping mall, you learn a lot of things about space doors. And diff models of craft." As Ace spoke, she fiddled with some sort of small device. Callom thought it looked like a portable radio with headphones. 

"That a lock-pick?"

She plastered it to the door. Then started to punch access codes into the digital entry pad. "It's something that lets me listen to what I'm doing."

"Strange that this part of the ship should be locked, when the other rooms we went through were all unlocked."

"Nearly there squirt . . . "

***

"We've got to get out of here," urged the geologist, looking up from the control panel. "Now." 

"Where's your spirit of adventure, Raina?"

"It's obvious that the people on this craft killed themselves. We can't accomplish much by sticking around here."

"What's with you? You look as if you've seen a ghost."

"I think we should find our friends and get the HELL out of here. . . "

Just then the ship lurched. "What did I tell you? This ship's still on a heading toward some solar system."

"I thought the stellar drive was out," said Raina. "At least that's what the log said."

"Don't you think that whoever left this log would make some effort to complete their mission? The auto pilot is suddenly engaged."

"You did something when you turned on the computer? Like activated some program or something when you accessed the journal."

Her anxious eyes met the Doctor's. Mutually he nodded. "Whoever left that log was counting on someone being able to read it at a later date."

"So that commander was expecting help?" she realized.

"Exactly. Even if it took a week, a month, or a century. If that's true, then wherever we are headed to may hold the answer to this mystery, Raina."

"Perhaps the person who set the auto pilot was crazy," suggested Raina.

"Perhaps, but I want to know why. These people were on a mission, and this commander was dead-set on completing it."

"I think we owe it to these people to try and figure out what killed them," argued Raina. "Let someone else go to their destination. Like another ship from the Mars Colony. It's their problem, right?"

"But they killed themselves. At least from what I've seen. And the people at their port of call will want whatever cargo is on board this ship." 

"Fine. But you can send a message to that colony and tell them."

"They might have an urgent need," persisted the Doctor. 

Sighing, Raina said, "Doctor, I think I'll find our friends. They might have found some more answers."

"You do that," he muttered, turning to the log once more.

Raina shook her head as she drifted away, and said, "Where do I start?"

"Try reading the signs. I think you can make them out…" he said, waving her away.

***

Another portal slid open. Ace and Callom jetted into the new room. Boxes and drums hung in zero G. Eerily their shadows floated with them, ghostly companions in a strange waltz. 

"Och, so quiet . . . " whispered Callom. "This must be the hold."

"You know lots about ships too, eh?"

"Ye can see that, lass. Take a look at this manifest. What were they shipping?"

"Huh, looks a lot like survey equipment to me," muttered Ace, drifting over to one crate. She glanced at the labels.

"I canna read this writing," complained Callom. "How can ye? No, lemme guess. You can read the writing cause ye were in space."

Ace nodded. "Says here . . . electronics . . . spares . . . "

Callom drifted by a latched-down box. He glanced at the cryptic symbols adorning it. A red cross was printed just under the stenciled letters. "I betch ye this is the first aid kit," he called.

"That's right. I thought you couldn't read the writing."

"A red cross is very clear," he giggled.

"Showoff," she muttered. 

"Whoa, what's this."

"What?"

"This box here says Experimental Growth Accelerator. And is it tied up good! There's a warning on it . . . " 

Distantly Callom discerned a voice. *What is it?

*Callom, where are you now?

*Ace n me are in the cargo hold. Jest looking aboot. She's found a device, called a Growth Accelerator.

*Stay there. I'm coming to meet you two.

***

Gracefully Raina pulled herself along the corridor. With a climbing rope and carabineer set she mountain-climbed the access rails as she went along. Miles of nylon rope now stretched along the ship passageways. "Just like mountain climbing without gravity," she laughed. How strange her training for geology was helping her in the middle of outer space. She came to the hatch Ace had opened with her futuristic lock-pick set. Distant voices echoed in her ears. One was Scots, the other Midlands. And arguing by the sound of them.

Something about the Doctor bothered her. She wanted to discover where the ship was headed. But she didn't want to set off there without first discovering what happened to the Cerise's crew. Did they kill each other out of suspicion, or did some outside force manipulate them to destroy each other through mind control?

*Callom, are you there?

*Aye.

*How are you two getting along there?

*She's right curious enau . . . 

Ace spun around when she heard Raina's swami belt jingling. The carbines on the mountain climbing gear rattled. "Cor! We thought you were a ghost or something."

Over in one corner, Callom covered his mouth to stifle his giggling. Lately everything made Ace jump, grabbing her baseball bat like he grabbed his skeindu when he was agitated. Up in one corner he perched, arms spread out anchoring him to a railing. He watched Raina clip a carabineer to the railing and run a blue nylon rope through it. "Yuir a wee spider nau, eh?"

Into the cabin she drifted. Closely the geologist noted all the floating crates sheathed in metal casing. Strange that the cargo should remain unscathed by the attacks. It was a relief ship, judging from the cargo manifest. 

"Brill idea, using the mountain climbing gear," commented Ace, gripping a nearby railing. "We just ran out of jet fuel."

"Jet fuel?"

Holding up the empty aerosol can, Callom explained, "Just a little idea of Ace's."

"Wish I had my flair gun to put this piton into," she muttered. "It'd be just the thing."

"Not really. You'd fly backwards whenever you'd try to use it."

"Where's the Professor gone off to?'

"He's on the command deck . . . " Raina said. "That's what he called it."

"Och, ye mean the bridge?"

Ace rolled her eyes. "That's the old-fashioned word for it."

Callom pulled a face at her. "Yuir jest mad you didna think of it."

"Now, guys, don't bite each others heads off . . . "

"Did he read the captain's log?" asked Callom, from his perch.

"Yes. It says the crew attacked each other when the star drive kept breaking down. They couldn't make it to their port of call, as you would say, Callom. But I feel like there was a saboteur on board," said Raina.

"Who'd want the cargo?" Ace asked.

"Mebbe someone wants that Growth Accelerator machine, or something?" suggested Callom. "But what would that do?"

"Accelerate growth," said Ace, smirking. "I'd have thought you'd know what that means."

"Of course I ken what the words mean. But what use is that device?"

"not sure," Raina said. "I'd guess it would be some futuristic device to stimulate the growth of crops on other planets? I mean since the Doctor said this was a colony ship… I'm assuming it's for colonizing other planets, right? But could it be used as a weapon?"

"Thought yuid ask that," jabbed Callom. She ignored him.

"Mabye," Ace mumbled. "I'm thinking from what I saw on Iceworld… I remember hearing about those devices and stuff. This one here.. might be used to accelerate the development of livestock. Accelerate chicken eggs into chicks and chickens. Or push the growth of wool. Even perhaps push evolutionary processes. But they'd need a temporal modulator on it to do that . . . "

"She sounds like the Doctor," muttered Callom.

"Yeaow!" they all cried. A lurch sent all three sailing in separate directions. Except for Raina, who grabbed hold of her rope. Engines boomed into life as the retrorockets fired. The geologist grabbed hold of the young Scot as he flew by her. Ace snagged the rope. All struggled to hold onto it or tie it to themselves.

"What started the motors?" cried Ace. 

"Someone's alive on this ship . . . " gasped Callom, fear rising in him. "Could be the Doctor? What do you think, yank?"

"I dunno, Ace. It doesn't feel like a tractor beam. The rockets are firing. How did it start up?" asked Raina.

"How long did it take you to get here, Prof?" asked Ace. "Do you think the Doctor got the ship on line?"

Both women glanced at each other. Callom felt resonance as the same thought crossed their minds. "Why would he start the ship up?"

"If he wanted to find out where it was going to go maybe . . . " snapped Raina, anger darkening her mature face. 

"You think the Professor would actually do that?" Ace wondered.

"He wanted to figure out where this ship was headed. He figured that whoever left the log would have programmed the ship to follow a certain course! But I think he's set off a trap!"

"Usually the Professor has a good reason for doing something . . . unless . . . " Ace trailed off. A similar look of fear crossed her face. She tried to hide it from Raina. But Callom knew Raina was not fooled.

"I've got to stop this ship!" announced Raina. Against the thrust of the rockets, she pulled herself back along the rope. "C'mon, Callom!"

"Coming!" he said obediently. Ace followed, protesting. Surely the Doctor knew what he was doing. At least most of the time. However there were times when she wasn't sure. He had a dark side, the part of him that was not human that surfaced from time to time. At those time he would sacrifice his friends for the greatest good. Ace shivered. She didn't know. And Raina's fierce devotion to protecting Callom also was frightening. She might take unnecessary risks to protect him.

That could spell conflict. "With a capital 'C'," joked Ace grimly, pulling herself along Raina's rope.

***

Unable to fix the gravity, the Doctor hovered over the command chair. He had moved the body of the Commodore to one side, and covered her face with a space blanket. Still, one detail bothered him. The name stated in the log for the planet. That planet the ship had been passing when the mutinies started. What did Raina say it was? He recalled the log entry. "Kala? Never heard of that star system," he mused, scratching above his left ear. His turtle face wrinkled in doubt. "Perhaps it was misspelled, or misread by our dear geologist want-to-be."

Scrolling though the journal entries, he saw that there were whole portions of text blanked out. With a frown, the Doctor, punched a few keys on the log console. He fumbled through his pockets to produce his half-moon reading glasses. "Passing near planetary system Ka__o four. G sequences star, ten planets. Three moons . . . "

Two letters were missing. The name of the system could be the name given by Earth colonists. Unlikely, because by this time period, the Earth colonists had made contact with other intelligent space faring civilizations.

Again he turned to a small console set into the navigational computer. Depressing a key he ringed up a three dimensional image of a star map. Among the stars traced a red line to indicate the ship's intended trajectory. "Theileria Minor," he muttered, looking at the M star binaries to the G star. He checked the present heading. Was there a deviation? Not according to the guidance system was there.

The ship shuddered and wheezed its way out of hyper drive. Streaks became single points again in the view-port. Discretely he coughed. Then peered out the view port, overtop his glasses. His eyes widened. "Great galaxies, this looks wrong!"

Constellations he gaped at through the view-port were not the corresponding ones in the stellar map!

"Kala?" he muttered, taking off his battered straw hat and tumbling about. "Karlo?"

Maneuvering thrusters fired. A light blinked, to indicate the ship had entered the gravity well of a solar system. At sub drive it sidled, past several terrestrial planets. As each planet whizzed by, the Doctor felt sicker. Theileria Minor's system was purporting to have two gas giants. This system had but one.

"It's not Kala," he muttered. "It's the homeworld of the Karakulians, also called Pyorrheas... no wonder the colonists went mad..."

Grimly he fired the ship's retrorockets. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his 500 diary, thumbing to the page about the Karakulians.

"Like the sirens of ancient myth, the Karakulians lure unsuspecting ships that pass by, to their world... for a variety of experiments. They test the mettle of any possible civilizations that dare to venture out this far into their solar system. Just Why they do this has several theories. However, the Karakulians main enemies, the Ehyrwell, have long sought to stop their unethical experiments, and regain their planet. Unfortunately in their last conflict, all Ehrywell were thought to have perished in a biological experiment gone wrong..."

His blood froze. It must have been two hundred years ago. How had the Karakulians managed to continue such activity for so long? Yet another race of beings who thought less of other species then to test their mettle and eventually exterminate their specimens. Had he rescued his friends from the Rani only to plunge them into another horrific nightmare fair of biological experiments?

****

Raina clawed her way along the rope. It was all she could do to hang on once the ship hit hyper drive. Yet now she breathed a sigh of relief as the stars became pinpoints of light once more. Captivated, the human geologist admired them through the glass. 

"Ahem."

"Ace. I didn't see you there. Where's Callom?"

"He's waiting in the other room. I want a word with you, Yank."

"Ace, what's wrong? That way you're staring at me, is uncomfortable."

"I get this feeling, like you don't trust the Professor," she admitted, brown eyes fixing into Raina's. Despite the fact she was weightless, Ace tried to lean against the corridor railing. All around them the linking corridor curved. It resembled a glass gerbil tube with a radius of eight feet, for in all directions an observer could see the stars.

"He could have brought us into a trap, for all we know," she snapped. "Just look at that."

"Yeah, we've entered a solar system. So?"

"That's not Theileria Minor!"

"How would you know?"

"I have a gut feeling… that's why…"

"Prove it, Yank. For all I know, how should the Doctor and I trust you?" 

"I don't know, kid, I just… dammit… have a bad feeling. Something smells wrong… why would people kill one another and then leave the ship running? If they WERE all dead, who would stick around to make sure it's running… I mean if they REALLY went nuts, I think they'd have blown it up or something.."

"Hold on a sec. Just suppose there was a mutiny on board,"

"Okay, shoot," Dr. MacLaren nodded.

"And a person set the ship to a new heading, for some reason. It could be there was no one left alive to set the new course."

"But if that was the case, why was there no one else in the control cabin but the Commander?" pointed out Raina.

"Maybe someone escaped from the ship," suggested Ace.

"No, the Doctor said something about… all life pods were in place." Shaking her head, Raina continued down the rope. Ace followed her. They reached the flight deck, in the `fore section of the Cerise. With a mighty shove Raina propelled herself to the command area. "I demand to know why you sent us to the wrong system!" she snapped.

Sadly the Doctor looked up from the control. "Well, how was I to know it was wrong? And what makes you so sure it is?"

"My gut feeling?" suggested Raina.

"My dear Raina, I am not that dense!" he protested. "You were the one who read the name of the star system wrong in the journal."

"Hey, pack it in you two!" 

Raina and the Doctor both shut up. Together they spun themselves to face Ace. "That's enough squabbling. Wrap up and tell me what the 'ecks gonna happen!"

"What do you think I just discovered?" interrupted the Doctor. "Of course we aren't headed there. Whoever sabotaged the ship obviously set it on a new course."

"Professor!"

"Well, at least since I last checked the log," continued the Doctor sheepishly. "And I think we will soon discover the answer to all our questions on that planet below."

Ace and Raina looked out to see a curved hemisphere rising up under the forward view-port. A dreary dark mantle of clouds drifted across its curve. Between swirls of the mantle peeked gray continents against gray seas. 

"Some toxic waste ball," muttered the geologist sadly. "Looks like a nuclear war hit it."

"Sadly, yes. This is clearly a war-torn world. Allow me to introduce you to the planet Pyorrhea's." 

"Pyrrorheas?" gasped Ace. "Where's that?"

"A planet fragmented by many wars. There should be no one there now. At least judging by the age of this ship. But someone is operating this device, and I must know why."

"What precisely are you hiding, Doctor," said Raina quietly. Grim faced, she held down her anger. She could just tell in her gut he was concealing something. It was instinct, but it screamed louder then ever before.

"Doctor!" shouted a young voice. Callom sailed into the room, pulling along Raina's lifeline. "There's a ship coming up to us! From the planet!"

"Ace, take Callom back to the TARDIS . . . and stay there . . . " began the Doctor. "You too, Raina."

"Doctor, I demand to know what the HELL you're worried about. That look on your face sure tells me it's life threatening!"

Anxious faces all looked toward the Doctor. "There's no time to tell you," he snapped. "Just do as I say, Raina."

"This time, Doctor," said Raina, staring him straight in the face. " I stay here, with you." He coughed nervously. 

Already Ace tugged at Callom's black jacket. She pulled him out the door after her. "C'mon Raina!" Callom urged. "There may be danger!"

"And he's going to tackle it alone?" snorted Raina. "No way! Callom, you go with Ace. "

Sighing the doctor tossed his isomorphic key towards Callom. Neatly Ace caught it, and the hatch door spiraled shut. 

"Rather noble of you to stay," sniffed the Doctor.

"Someone has to make sure you stay out of trouble. Obviously you expected a trap, and you fell right into it. But what are you plotting now?"

"Ace and Callom should be safe in the TARDIS. The attackers should not notice it, if it's in the corridor I think it is." Raina watched him run fingers down some warmth buttons. "There, that should close off their section of the ship. As soon as their infrared signals pass the sensor."

"Say what?"

"I programmed the camera to respond to the humanoid temperature range. All the door sensors, with the exception of the cargo bays and private quarters, are triggered by heat patterns. Specifically those of a human body, or part of a human body."

"So you programmed the doors to open and close to a general heat pattern, Doctor. For their sake, I hope whoever's boarding us won't. But what do we do?"

"Sit tight for a few minutes. Then I want you to head down to the cargo bay. And reel in the rope as you go."

"What then?"

"Get the Growth Accelerator. And slip into the aft section of the ship. I guessed from the design of this ship the aft section can be jettisoned from the front as a safety measure."

"Won't the attackers shoot it down?"

"Not after the reception I'll give them," grinned the Doctor mischievously. "Now get going."

****

Sounds reverberated along the axis of the ship. Frantically the two children grabbed at the rope, their lifeline to safety. "I wish someone would turn on the gravity!" complained Callom. 

"I thought you liked being in space, squirt."

"It's no fun anymore, Ace. No wi' space pirates latching on n' all."

"Pirates?" scoffed Ace. "Stop thinking in the past! We're gonna be okay. Just keep climbing!" Three percussive blasts rocked the chamber. "Sounds like they're cutting through," muttered Ace. 

"Why dinna they jest use the airlock or something?"

"That door probably has a locking mechanism. And whoever is breakin in isn't foolin around."

Raina's rope meandered along the metal corridors in the aft section of the ship. Ace guessed they were in the residential area. The ship was in three sections, the cargo and residential were in the middle, while the drive unit was separated by three pylons spacing it far from the rest of the craft. A short corridor, the one Raina had taken her astral reading in, connected the residential crew quarters to the command deck. Here was where the flying and stellar cartography were done. This research vessel was a standard Aries class ship. Ace had seen several come and go from the colony planet of Iceworld. That had happened before she met the Doctor. And after she'd left Earth. Memories of cleaning up other people's messes in a drink bar on a futuristic shopping mall flashed for a moment in her mind's eye. She shut the memory door on that chapter in her life. At last Callom reached the door. Automatically it spiraled open. "Get in, quick!" Ace told him, and gave him a shove. Reaching out behind herself she reeled in the rope as before. Then thrust herself through before the door completely sealed shut behind her.

Distantly they heard explosions. "C'mon. Get a move on, kid!" Ace cried to Callom. For painful moments they threaded their way through the scorched walled hallways. People once had walked here, and lived and laughed here. Now the two children simply sought the refuge of the familiar. The TARDIS floated in mid air, slowly rotating. Eagerly Ace and Callom slipped inside.

***

Meanwhile, Raina was a few minutes behind. Hand over hand she crawled to the cargo hold on the underside of the middle section. As she went, she reeled in her rope, careful not to touch the rope in front of herself. She too heard the bangs and explosions ripping into the Cerise. Glancing out through round ports she saw the craft latched alongside. She could make out a strange metal surface, not lead, but incredibly dense. All through her journey she caught glimpses of the saucer like craft gliding up from the planet's surface, and as it encroached upon the ship. Yet the Doctor said there was no time to explain. He had explaining to do. Raina had never heard of Pyrrorheas. The name sounded hard and cruel, even to her ears. What sort of civilization existed there? She was certain to find out soon enough. Another boom sounded awful close. Raina eased herself down a vertical shaft, perpendicular to the one in which she'd traversed. A pressure door led down to the cargo deck. Seconds later she pushed herself down. Glanced at all the undelivered cargo. People's lives most likely depended on its arrival, and it would never come. All the space mail and the foodstuffs and seeds that would never be planted sat in their metal sealed crates. Raina shook the visions out of her imagination, and crossed over to the wrapped electronic devices. It was easy for her to read the modern labels written in Hispanariese letters. "El Accelerando Germinating," she muttered, gripping a bundle about the size of her arm. Compact by twenty-second century standards, this device could germinate a field in a matter of days, which would normally take weeks. Whoever invented this biocatalyzer that sped up cell division was taking on enormous responsibility. Strange about Time Travel. You saw the general trends, even if you gaped at the immensity of the Continuum. Event after event and a multitude of dizzying possibilities could make a human's mind mad. Yet to Raina she saw the awesome totality with childlike simplicity. How did the Time Lords perceive History?

Fzam!

Raina peeled herself off the wall. Somehow the gravity was reactivated. Her whole body felt heavy, even thought they were falling around the planet at several thousand miles per hour. Against the pull of the field she hauled herself up the rope hand over hand, device carefully tied to her back with a length of nylon rope. She reached the horizontal shaft. Pressing down on cold metal she hauled herself out of the pressure cell leading to the cargo hold. For a brief time she allowed herself to rest and catch her breath. "Gee, gravity is exhausting," she heard herself say. Tottering to her feet, she stumbled off down the corridor as fast as she could.

Each step became easier as her feet clanged against the metal floor. Each step carried her away from the explosions. Just what was the Doctor doing up on the bridge of the Cerise? She remembered him shutting the pressure door behind her as she left. And punching keys like a piano player. Once more she was in the maze of corridors. The residential section on levels One and Two were where the crew cabins existed. Following the pattern of scorch marks she traced her way back to the TARDIS.

KABOOM!

Raina grabbed the railing for dear life. Suddenly the wall blew inward. Cold void opened mere yards away through a jagged frame. All the air around her sucked out to fill the vast maw of space. With tremendous strength she struggled to pull herself to a door, or anyplace still pressurized. Despite her terror she was awestruck. She spotted the alien ship latched onto the side of the Cerise with an airlock tube. Beneath them both moved the convex curve of the gray orb. It filled half the sky, moving into its nighttime phase. She could see every minute detail of curling swirling cloud masses crossing the terminator. Every storm, every gale swishing miles below.

Spiraling out in space was a blue box. The TARDIS rushed away from the Cerise, blown back by the explosive decompression. Raina would soon follow, if her strength gave out. Already her frostbitten fingers were slipping from the freezing barite bar. Holding her breath she clipped herself to the bar with a carabineer. Slid herself along the bar to a doorway. Hoped and prayed she could get the door, mere inches away, open. Her hair felt as if it would be sucked from her scalp. She tried to equalize the pressure in her ears in vain. Something was drifting away from the ship. A small craft, spherical with three rods and a cylinder protruding. Tiny lights twinkled at points in the white sphere. It was none other than the flight deck of the Cerise. One of the blasts had torn it loose.

Huddled together in the TARDIS, Callom and Ace saw Raina's desperate battle. "Och no!" cried the Scot. "We gotta save her!"

"How?" demanded Ace.

"I must. . . teleport to her. . ."

"You can't from this distance!" protested Ace. "The force field in the TARDIS will stop you!"

"I canna let her die!" shouted Callom. "When you see us on the scanner screen, open the doors and pull us in!"

"What?"

"Tie the rope ye pulled in around yon console! Tie yuirself to it, and then ye won't be sucked out so ye can pull us in!"

Gathering all his courage he fixed the sight of Raina in his mind. The distance was increasing by the minute. But as long as he could see her he was alright.

A switch fired in his mind. A circuit completed, and he was there by her side, grabbing onto her as she was being sucked away. Wrapping his arms around her, he sucked a breath and stared out into infinity. Just a blue speck now was the TARDIS. It didn't orbit with the ship, for the explosive decompression had blown it away. Callom unclipped the carabineer and let himself be sucked into space. He knew he'd survive, for at least a minute anyway. Just long enough to see the TARDIS, and think his way there. Long enough to feel Ace's hand clench them and haul them into the TARDIS before the air ran out.

Before they could pull themselves in, something happened. A beam caught hold of the TARDIS, tractoring them. Ace barely managed to pull them through the doors before the TARDIS was pulled forwards. Towards the ship. A large spiral hatch spun open, and the TARDIS was draw inside.

***

A streak of fire bashed its way through the Pyorrhean atmosphere. The Doctor gritted his teeth as his back was pressed up against the seat back. Tremendous G-Forces ripped at him. Reaching against the amazing pressure his hand hit the antigrav switch. Stabilizers pushed against the planet's surface. If he glimpsed out the forward view screen he could see gray streaks blowing up beneath the ship. And the glowing trails of fire soaring between himself and the streaks. Quickly the glow drifted from white-hot to orange, then to cherry red. At last the heat cleared, and he could see the convex curve of the planet looming ahead. Trees cracked as the ship skimmed through. Everything went black behind his eyes.

***

Half-dazed Raina dragged herself out of the flight deck. Instinct had kicked in. Her hands gripped the collars of her friends jackets. Had to get out. From beneath the wreckage. Slowly she wormed her way out, and ashen air hit her lungs. Gasping, she staggered to her feet, and noticed the charred and twisted remains of the ship. High shapes rose around her, and she pushed her glasses up on her nose again, glad they had survived. A small tinkling like glass being struck by water met her ears, and she whirled about in alarm. Her hands flew up to defend herself from the unknown attacker. Yet, when she seized the figure that had drawn up behind her she heard an anguished gurgle.

"Hrrgh..." he gasped. "Mind you... that's no way to say thank you..."

"Doctor?" she gasped. "Where... what... dammit where are we?"

"If you'd release me, I'll explain," he gasped. She did so, letting the Doctor's throat release from her grasp. 

"I'm really sorry," she said, backing away.

"I see you're uninjured," he said with a sigh of relief as he brushed himself down. "Can I presume you are if you're standing... if you're not I can..."

"I think you've helped us enough, Doctor," Dr. Mariner grumbled. "Where the hell are we?"

"Pyorrheas," he said, clearing his throat. "But there is no time for that now. We must find Ace and Calom, and quickly..."

"Pyorrheas... how do you know..." she asked, rushing after him as he turned back to the wreckage. "You mean you've BEEN here before?"

"Unfortunately yes. Some two hundred years ago. And I'm sorry for getting you involved in this," he muttered, probing the wreckage with his umbrella tip. "But we must work fast..."

"Doctor... I demand to know WHAT this is about!"

"The main race of this world, called the Karakulians… they are scientists, arrogant and cruel," he said. "Not unlike the Rani. They did not think any civilization should surpass them in the ways of science."

"Terrific... care to explain why... and what this has to do with the Cerise?" Ray demanded.

"There was another race on this world, the Erweyl, who opposed the development of their genetic research, and challenged their arrogance. However the two races fought, and the Karakulians were shocked to find out that the Erweyl had surpassed them in one realm of science... that of space travel. Rather then continue the war that has reduced their planet to this... wasteland, the Erweyl fled..."

"Like this..." she asked, glancing around at the gray mists swirling around them. Only the bare bones of tall-striated crystalline trees passed between them and the ashen sky. "What did they do?"

"The Erweyl were pacifists, not fighters. Once this was a world worthy of Earth itself in its diversity and beauty. They fled to the nearest planet, fourth from the sun named Deuceine, to rebuild, and somehow find a way to stop the Karakulians. However, they could do nothing to stop the Karakulians from luring unsuspecting ships here... to enslave and experiment upon their civilizations. But I tried to put a stop to it... and I fear my past interference is what brings us here now..."

"What are you saying... that the Cerise..."

"Was bait," he said. "They know about the existence eof the time lords, thanks to me. And for this, I'm sorry. I wouldn't' be surprised if they have used the captured Erweylian technology to build devices that are even more monstrous that scan space-time for disturbances..."

"So, we're here now... but surely if you've faced them before, you can do so again," Ray whispered, unholstering her axe and helping him to dig. 

"I'm afraid it will be more difficult this time around," the Doctor lamented, wrinkling his brow. He dabbed his forehead with his paisley handkerchief. "For they are expecting me."

"Damn..."

"When earth ships and other civilizations developed spaceflight, and started passing by their star system, they'd lure them to this world, and test them in a barrage of bizarre experiments. If they survived, they were enslaved. If they died, the Karakulians did not consider them a threat..." the Doctor muttered. "And obviously since the inhabitants of the Cerise survived, they consider any Earth people a threat..."

"What can we do?"

"Find Ace and Callom, and then decide," the Doctor muttered.

***

After they crashed, she wanted to take the commander's body out of the flight deck and give it a proper burial. Unfortunately, the Doctor disagreed.

"We don't have time to pick daisies," he snapped.

"But we should pay respect to the dead, Professor," said Ace.

"With the Karakulians possibly searching for us?"

Ace dragged the Commander's body. Luckily, the woman wasn't too heavy. Already rigor mortis had set in.

"How's Callom?"

"Still out cold, Doctor. Where in blazes are we?"

"Pyorrheas. This is a Petrified Forest."

All overhead were brittle branches. Gray sunlight cast its light on bone white trunks. Beneath their feet they could feel the crunch of the under growth, long since shattered.

"Where's the TARDIS?" the Doctor asked.

"I'll look around," said Raina. "Keep an eye on Callom."

The young Scot lay motionless on a space blanket. His skin looked as pale as the surrounding landscape. Ace sensed Raina was worried sick, although she hid it well. "Ace," she said. "Let's take our Commander back to the Flight deck..."

Raina slipped her hands under the body and hefted it to her shoulders. Ace clutched her bat and followed. At least Raina showed interest in respecting the dead. Minutes later, they spotted the Police Box. It sat on its side, buried half way into the charred ground. "Is nothing alive here?" Ace asked.

"It's been dead for years," said Raina.

"How do you know, if you've never been here?"

"Death's stench cries out. That's why. Call it an impression. "

"What do you mean?"

"An echo. Many locations have temporal impressions of stressful events. The forest is riddled with them. And plus I can tell from the geology of the rocks they were stressed by intense heat…"

"We'll need a shovel to get this out," said Ace, practical minded. Hands thrust into her pockets, she circled the half-buried TARDIS.

Raina spotted the fractured eggshell of the crashed flight deck. A huge gash spread up the two hemispheres. Shouldering the commander's body, she stepped inside. Then she disappeared from view. Ace cautiously followed. Inside the flight deck, Raina lay the commander on her chair. Ace covered her with a blanket. For a moment, the two women regarded each other. What could you say about a woman you hardly knew?

"What do we say, yank?" she asked. "It's not like we were buddies or anything."

Raina looked up at the sky and the planet around her. "Dear God, I stand in the midst of death. This woman is far from her home and family. Yet, she did not die in vain. The people here, on this planet, didn't either. I ask whatever power this woman believed in to take her to where she needs to be. Maybe the lives here, can keep her comforted with their understanding."

"What?"

"I didn't know her. But I did know she did the best job protecting her crew. She was brave to the last. And God grant her the rest she deserves…"

Ace noticed Raina's silence. She opened her own mouth to say, "I didn't know her either. But she had nerve. Stood of to disaster when everyone went crazy. Just hope her family, friends will know she's found. Wherever she is, hope it's better than here."

Raina nodded, and covered the commander's face. Then, the geologist turned to the gash, and stepped one foot outside. In her hands, she carried a small box. Ace guessed it must be the log of the craft. In the clearing, the Doctor gently fingered Callom's cheek. Cold and clammy to the touch, the lad's skin seemed almost like rubber. Still, the Doctor felt the breaths slowly wafting against his hand. He spun around. Ace and Raina crunched through the fragile fossil pants. 

"Back so soon," he asked.

"Yeah. Any change, Professor?"

"Still the same."

"We found the TARDIS," said Raina. "About fifty feet from here."

Dusty air made Raina cough. "I'd like to get moving," said the Doctor. "It's not safe to stay..."

"We're going t' have some digging ahead of us," said Ace.

"Let's go."

"I'll take Callom," said Raina. Before anyone could argue, she slipped hands under his knees and back. Then squatting, she lifted him up. Effortlessly she stood, cradling him in her arms. Ace hoped they wouldn't join the restless spirits here. As the followed the Doctor in the strange procession, she shivered away the coldness.

It was only fifty yards to the TARDIS. Fifty yards too many. Ace glanced around herself warily as she usually did. To her young ears, each sound felt magnified in the gaunt silence. That kind of silence that sucks all little noises into itself, and spits them back out a hundred times louder. Her ears clung to the sanity in her own crunching footsteps, and those of the Doctor ahead of her, and Raina behind her.

Raina suddenly pushed from behind. "I heard something. Tell him to pick up the pace...."

The Doctor stopped. Everyone crashed into his restraining arm. "Stop right there," he hissed.

"What..." came out of Ace's lips before she choked them back.

"Turn around, quietly..." he choked. All the color blanched from his face. Hands gripped his umbrella as he looked back only with his eyes.

"When I tell you to run, run..." he said stiffly, in the same volume of whisper.

"The TARDIS..."

"Don't ask questions, Dr. Mariner," he grunted. "Just do as I say..."

Raina read the urgency in his tense clamped jaw, and silent anger. Something was preventing them from getting to the TARDIS. Whatever it was, the Karakulians perhaps, the Doctor feared enormously. When the Doctor was that afraid, she knew it had to be terrible. They placed their steps cautiously in the undergrowth as they retreated. Raina, the Doctor, and Ace all backpedaled. A high pitched electronic whine impeded at the top of Ace's hearing. Like those tone tests she had to take in school so many years ago. Where the nurse tested the high frequencies, you could hear. Or that whine that computer screens gave off when they were on in a lab. Only this whine grew in intensity.

"Run!" thundered the Doctor, when they had retreated ten feet. He shoved past Raina and Ace, clutching his hat to his head. Raina and Ace rushed after him.

"What's stopping us from going to the TARDIS?" asked Raina, between labored breaths. She shifted Callom to her back.

"We must get to the city," breathed the Doctor. "It's the only place."

"But if we go there, they'll trap us for sure," cried Ace.

"That's the only place we can be safe from the radiation. The mountains have cut off our retreat. Anywhere we go their scanners can track us..."

"What about into the forest?" asked Raina.

"We wouldn't survive. There are worse mutations running around in there..."

But then they could no longer comment upon any mutations, for they had been found! Raina drew in her breath sharply, clutching Callom to her.

"Run!" the Doctor shouted. "To the city!"

***

What will happen to the Time Travelers? Will the Karakulians capture them? Will Raina and Callom be able to trust the Doctor? Find out in Part 2! 


	3. A Growing Madness Part 2

Disclaimer: The characters of Dr. Who and Ace are property of BBC. The character of Raina Vitreum and Callom MacLaren are property of me. My characters mean now harm to the show. This is written out of enjoyment for a creative show... and to preserve a good sf time travel saga!  
  
A Growing Madness  
  
Part 2:PLANET SIDE  
  
Theresa E. Meyers  
  
Written 1996, revised 1998 ***  
  
Next, Callom recalled waking up. He saw floor rushing underneath him, and the walls around him jarring up and down. Someone was carrying him over their shoulder. Raina had him slung on her back like a sack of wheat.  
  
"But why didn't they kill us?" Ace and the Doctor were running ahead of them. Callom tried to make sense of the sequence of events. Hadn't he just tried to save Raina? And here she was, perfectly alright, hauling him around.  
  
"Och, ma head!" he exclaimed.  
  
"Keep it down," snapped Raina's voice, muffled, yet distinct. "They'll hear us!"  
  
"What happened?"  
  
"We're in the Karakulian's city. We've got to get away," she said hastily.  
  
"Wait, let me doon!"  
  
"You're too weak to move on your own," she huffed, stumbling.  
  
"Quick, let's stop here a minute," said the Doctor's voice. Something white waved in his left hand. Graphed lines and pieces of transparent plastic were taped to its surface. Was it some kind of map?  
  
Callom felt himself being propped up against a wall. He could see Ace crouching next to the Doctor. All around them curved steel corridors, made of a grey dense substance. There was little light.  
  
"Doctor, where are we?" murmured Callom, trying to see straight.  
  
"Rest easy lad," urged the Doctor softly. "You only just teleported two times. We thought you'd never wake up."  
  
"The alien ship! Did they capture us?"  
  
"No," said the Doctor. "I recalled the TARDIS to materialize on board the bridge."  
  
"We're na on it nau are we?" he asked.  
  
"No. We're on a planet called Karakul."  
  
"Karakul?" moaned Callom, holding his head. Raina massaged his temples.  
  
"Since when did we get here?"  
  
"Since a few hours ago, Callom. You saved my life. Thanks."  
  
"Och, it was nothing, Raina. Ma head!"  
  
"That's what happens with overextending oneself," scolded the Doctor. But his eyes shone.  
  
"Here they come," hissed Ace, ducking from around a corner.  
  
"Can you walk?"  
  
"Aye. Jest ye watch me, Doctor. But what is after us?"  
  
"Their collectors," the Doctor whispered. "Unfortunately the Karakulians remain inside their labs, using their machines to do their dirty work... their collectors are their hands and eyes... and we must take the ultimate care..."  
  
All four Time Travelers scurried off into the corridors. Ace gripped her baseball bat, the Doctor his umbrella. Raina took good hold of an ice axe, hefting it in one hand. Such primitive objects were ludicrously inadequate to confront the creatures they now saw.  
  
A whole string of machines coasted towards them, each approximately four feet tall. They hovered only a millimeter above the floor on circular bases. Their squared off tops contained many blinkign sensors, which the Doctor explained could track infrared as well as ultraviolet and heat emitting form their bodies. Together the mechanisms must have a good field of view. At about three feet from their base projected multiple robotic probe arms, including pincer arms, and a long gun nozzle, which crackled with the power of ten tazers. . One blast of blue sparks narrowly missed the Doctor as he skipped lightly out of the way.  
  
Ace gritted her teeth as they retreated. "Wish I could fight them," she snapped to the Doctor.  
  
"Would you like to stop and ask them to play fairly?" he retorted, clutching his straw hat down on his head as he ran after her.  
  
"Hop aboard," ordered Raina, squatting, gesturing to Callom to stand behind her.  
  
"I dinna understand! Did we jest escape, or what?" He wrapped his arms around her neck while she locked his ankles in her folded arms. Felt the floor dissapear as she stood up and ran. Not underestimating her strength he still gripped hold for dear life. By glancing over his shoulder he could see the squat mini-tanks shadowed on the corridor walls, only fifty feet behind them.  
  
Raina trotted effortlessly with Callom piggyback. "Och, I ken run guid enau!" he protested.  
  
"Cool it kid! I'm not letting you slip away this time!"  
  
Callom felt as if he'd tuned into a soap opera without having watched for a week. It was so frustrating to be clinging to someone's back running for their lives without knowing why.  
  
*Raina, why are we running away from these things. I ken they mean to kill us!  
  
*They knew that ship had the Growth Accelerator. They wanted it."  
  
*What wuild those wee tanks want with that? I dinna understand!"  
  
*Neither do I, but the Doctor thinks they trapped passing spaceships with a new weapon. A weapon that can disable a ship by attacking its sub-space drive unit."  
  
*If they have tha technology, they could build their ain gizmo growth Accelerator.  
  
*That's what I can't understand why either... she admitted.  
  
Ace stopped in her tracks, and pulled out a deodorant can. "No Ace, there isn't time!"  
  
"Oh right, Professor," she shouted. "Like I want to be exterminated!"  
  
"We need to conserve our resources."  
  
"Well then, come on! Don't hang about!"  
  
"May I suggest something?" asked Raina, as the Doctor pulled Ace along behind him. "Since we're only down the next level from the labs..."  
  
"What?"  
  
"See that doorway up ahead?"  
  
"Yeah, so?"  
  
"Looks like it leads to a room, a power area. If we could get in there, and blockade them out . . ."  
  
"With two cans of weak explosives?" questioned the Doctor, huffing.  
  
"With just one."  
  
They reached the door. Quickly the Doctor smacked the switch with his umbrella. Swinging Callom off her back, Raina bustled everyone inside.  
  
"Hurry up, get in!" shouted Ace. "They're almost on top of us!"  
  
Callom saw Raina examining the cracks in the door frame. "Come on, Raina! They're coming."  
  
"Okay." She let him pull her into the room, just before the door slid shut. Inside, Ace hunted for something to blockade the entrance with.  
  
The room was filled with computer terminals and various electronic devices. It was anyones guess as to what its purpose. Bent over, the Doctor examined the closest console lining one wall. Light panels in the ceiling gave fluorescent illumination. "There are several struts placed at cross angles," Raina annouced. "A precise explosion would blow the whole shebang down . . ."  
  
The Doctor made a rapid mental calculation. His fingers moved as if scribbling invisible equations on an invisible chalkboard. "Could work, I suppose." "Give me the explosive, Ace," Raina asked, holding out her frilly cuffed hand. She felt the cold metal aerosol can pressed into it.  
  
Raina tapped places in the metal walls with her geological hammer. She scanned the wall struts around the metal hatch. "Hmm, not your typical alloy. Looks like a carbonized steel annealed with some lighter aluminum salt."  
  
"Stop admiring the fixtures and do what you're gonna do..." cried Ace. The teenager's skin crawled as she watched the geologist whack the wall in one place. Distant blasts were getting steadily louder.  
  
"The stress fractures indicate the material's weakest here," said Raina, turning to the Doctor. "Right? According to Moh's equations . . ."  
  
"Exactly. Using the harmonic constant . . ." realized the Doctor. Absently he passed his map to Callom.  
  
Raina placed the can in a crack tapped out with her hammer. Then gestured everyone to the far wall. Grabbing Callom's shoulder, the Doctor helped him to crouch on the floor.  
  
"How many seconds?" asked Raina.  
  
"Eight . . ."  
  
"Uh oh . . ."  
  
Bang!  
  
Metal supports blew out of place. Both the Doctor and Callom huddled together, the Doctor clutching his hat more firmly on his head. The whole wall atop the girders slid down vertically in one sheet. Two or three struts clattered down on top.  
  
"Mega!" cried Ace. She swatted Raina on the shoulder, laughing. "That oughtta shop n' make em think!"  
  
"What a kick . . ."  
  
"How'd you do it, Yank?"  
  
"She knocked out the weld supports, instead of the metal. Caused the metal to fracture. But that's only bought us a few minutes," explained the Doctor. "We'd better find a way out of here."  
  
"I'll scout ahead," offered Raina. She stopped momentarily to slip her geological hammer into a holster at her hip.  
  
"Wait for me, Yank."  
  
"It's a shame we can't weld these struts to the wall and seal them out permanently," muttered the Doctor. He hunted around for anything remotely resembling a torch or a melder.  
  
Ace and Raina searched the chamber. The teenager clutched the map once held by the Doctor. Several huge turbines whirred in unison. "Funny,"  
  
"What, Ace?"  
  
"That these Karakulians should have a city running on electricity, instead of nuclear energy or something."  
  
Raina bent over one of the generators. Took a quick look, and shook her head. "Could be using a nuclear fuel," she suggested. "There's some radiation present."  
  
"Better get a move on, Yank."  
  
Fzam! Both flinched as they heard the guns blazing away at the improvised barricade. "Those Collectors sound awful close."  
  
"Anyway, can you find the power room on the map?" Ray asked.  
  
"Not really."  
  
"Where are the labs?"  
  
"Looking on this here map, about a kilometer. Towards the northeast section of the City."  
  
Raina dug through the pockets of her vest once more. Extracted a compass with a mirrored lid. On her flat palm she held it out at arm's length away from her body. "Correcting for the magnetic disturbances, this says north is behind this wall."  
  
"But these generators are screwing up the compass aren't they?"  
  
Giving the generators a wide berth, Raina rounded the corner into another chamber. Behind several drums there appeared to be a door. "C'mere, Ace. I see a door. North by northwest. About fifty degrees from north magnetically."  
  
"But the wires . . ."  
  
"I should be far enough away from them by now."  
  
"Hey Doc!" Ace shouted. "Ray's found another door in back. Behind these turbines!"  
  
"Our friends are having a time trying to get through," announced the Doctor. In his hands he clutched what looked like a gun with a short muzzle. Still he required two hands to hold it. "Luckily I scraped together this maser. Welded them out."  
  
"Great, but how many minutes does that give us, Professor?"  
  
"I'd estimate, about seven-point-six . . ."  
  
"Doctor, I think they're getting thru!" cried Callom.  
  
"That was an upper estimate. I should have guessed they'd have rolled in the heavy artillery."  
  
"Hey, why aren't they coming in through the back door?" Ace suddenly shouted to Raina.  
  
"I don't know. Perhaps there's something back here that doesn't lead to the outside corridor . . ."  
  
"Can your maser cut through doors?" Raina asked the Doctor.  
  
"What? What are you doing, Raina?"  
  
"Trying to get out of here, Doctor."  
  
"But that room, is the nuclear power center! That's why they're not coming through the door . . ."  
  
Immediately Ace grabbed the Doctor's improvised weapon and fired at the other door. "We must do something now!" she cried.  
  
"Wait, perhaps the Growth accelerator's power unit can boost the laser . . ."  
  
"If the power for the turbines comes from the next room . . ." gasped Raina. "They've trapped us?"  
  
"Looks like it."  
  
"Radiation exposure might be lethal," said the Doctor. "I should have thought of that."  
  
"It's no like the Karakulians would map out every section of their city," chimed in Callom. "If they are our enemy and all . . ."  
  
"It was my idea," sighed Raina, guilty. She clamped her jaw tightly as she watched Ace burning through the lock on the radiation door. Small droplets of metal dripped off painfully slowly.  
  
"Oh, don't be silly, Raina," sighed the Doctor. "It gives us some time. To think."  
  
"But the radiation effects might only be temporary," said Raina. "If we run through the room. That is, if there's another door."  
  
"The map doesn't say whether there is or not," shouted Ace.  
  
"Not if it's a lead lined room. But wait. If these Karakulians live on this planet, they must be used to the ambient radiation. It wouldn't bother them much to have a nuclear room in their city. So they most likely wouldn't waste time putting in unnecessary shielding . . ." realized the Doctor.  
  
BLAM! The barricade glowed red, then yellow. "Hurry Ace!" cried Callom.  
  
"Move towards the door," urged the Doctor, pushing him towards Raina. He gripped the Growth Accelerator, still wrapped in its casing.  
  
White hot fire grew from the center of the barricade. Equally white hot sparks burst from the maser. Before it overloaded, Ace tossed it to one side. "I won't take this!" cried Ace. "We're only a few meters away from the labs!"  
  
"Move over Ace," said Raina. "It's done its work." The Martian born geologist shouldered her ice axe. With one mighty blow she smashed into the molten steel. Two mighty blows later she knocked out the remaining material. Hot material splattered into the next room.  
  
Meanwhile the Doctor watched the first door glow luminescent. Spots of the corridor outside were showing through. He gestured the three of them to race through the opening cut by the maser with his handkerchief. Still he toted his improvised maser.  
  
Huge vats of power stood in the new chamber. Instead of dynamos, large tanks with fuel rods stood at the same intervals. Gingerly the trio wormed around the units to the far door. Which was fastened by a combination lock. Ace went to work. The Doctor followed, trotting at top speed as he clutched his umbrella. "They're almost through!" he cried.  
  
A blast knocked him on the floor. Raina raced to his side, jerking him to his feet with surprising strength.  
  
"Professor, I need a hand with this!" Ace shouted.  
  
"Where's the device?"  
  
Ace gave him a horrified look. "I thought you had it!"  
  
"I. . . must have dropped it," he realized.  
  
"Work, Doctor! I'll get it!" decided Raina.  
  
Desperately the Doctor stabbed keys. Raina raced for the door, and dashed through the still molten metal. Callom was close behind. Just inside lay the discarded object.  
  
"HALT! HALT!" grated an electronically charged Karakulian voice. Raina froze. Callom climbed through the doorway that minute, to see Raina covered by a Karakulian gun.  
  
*Callom! Get back!  
  
Just inches from Raina lay the device. She pushed it back with her hand.  
  
"Hey, over here!" shouted Callom. Swallowing his courage, he dove for the device.  
  
A gun blazed. Callom's hands found the package.  
  
"HALT. Decist specimines!" grated a second Karakulian, just gliding into the room. The young Scot threw his arm over his eyes.  
  
"Push off! We're going nowhere!" shouted Ace defiantly. She stood in the burned entrance. Reaching into her backpack, she drew out a deodorant can. "Let `em go!"  
  
"Analsis of container indicates highly unstable explosive!"  
  
Holding the can in front of her, she moved towards Raina. "Back off now!" Slowly the squat metal shapes slid back. Callom raced across the room. Under his arm he carried the strangely shaped parcel. As if glued to his motion, the Karakulian's sensor pod swiveled. Raina raced after the Scots lad. "Look out everyone!" she shrilled. Backed against the wall were Doctor, Ace, and the frightened Callom folding into Ace's satin sleeved arms. The door was open now, as the trio tumbled backwards into safety.  
  
"Commense specimine immobilization!"  
  
"YEEARRGH!" came a blood curdling scream, almost inhuman in nature. Instantly, a whoosh and a blinding flash enveloped Raina. Her cheek and whole front smashed into bare cold metal. Searing pain drilled into her thigh. She could smell fabric and flesh sizzling.  
  
Shoving Callom behind herself, Ace raced to Raina's side. "You bloody monsters . . ." she began, yet the words died in her throat as she trembled with horror and anger. Furiously she stared daggers at the cold metal shapes.  
  
"What have you done?" thundered the Doctor.  
  
"Subject has been immobilized. Inferior specimines will proceed to holding lab, or will be TERMINATED."  
  
Raina groggily shook her head as Ace and the Doctor leaned over her. "Can't you see this person can hardly walk?" he snapped.  
  
"You will assist. Move!" grated the Karakulian, gliding forwards.  
  
Grimly the Doctor and Ace raised Raina to a vertical position. They draped her arms over their shoulders. Callom slowly shambled before the group. ***  
  
PART FIVE  
  
Mirror lined walls rose up all around them. Save on one side where a dancing field of lasers separated them from freedom. Callom hunched down into the corner of his cell, miserably fixing his eyes on Raina's huddled form. Ace tried her best to nurse the geologist's recent burn. Offering soothing words were all she could do to keep Raina quiet. Finally the pain forced her into dreamless unconsciousness. She lay there on her cloak so rigidly and still, hardly breathing. Callom hugged his knees, and said nothing. He was sure he could hear himself whimpering, to his shame. Someone's hand rested on his shoulder, reassurance in its very touch. "It wasn't your fault, lad," said the Doctor softly. A trace of Scots accent laced his voice. A reassuring burr that went straight to Callom's core. "If she hadna pushed me outta the way . . . she'd be all right," he replied shakily. "Friends are always making sacrifices for me, when I don't exactly expect them to," explained the Doctor, removing his hat. He pulled himself closer to Callom, and sat down very much the same. Like two schoolboys they perched side by side, hugging their knees and talking quietly. "But has one of yuir friends ever died savin ye?" "There were a few times . . . but mostly . . . " Silence choked off his reply for a moment. "But my companions always managed to come out safe and well, after I set them straight." The male arrogance made Callom smile, briefly. "It's jest that she almost died a few hours ago. Vitreum. And now Dr. MacLaren..." "I know. But if the Karakulians wanted her dead, they would have totally destroyed her. They simply stunned her... but unfortunately in so doing their almost broke her leg..." "Doctor..." "I will do what I can to help her. There is still a possibility that I can use that growth accelerator to push her leg to heal itself." "But you cant even get out of this cell," Callom sighed. "Did I ever tell you, when a Time Lord is injured, they slip into a protective coma. Many times I've fooled a friend or enemy into thinking I'm dead." "Oh, I betcha they love that," smiled Callom. "One of my friends in particular was fooled all the time. Her name was Sarah Jane Smith. She'd always believed I'd died, and be hunched over me, crying . . . and then I'd sit up perfectly fit . . . " "And she'd freak," finished Callom, shaking his head. "Ye gotta admit that was a dirty trick to play on her. But Dr. Mariner is no Time Lord." "I know, but I am quiet certain she will recover... given time..." "I hope yuir right." *** Meanwhile Raina stirred, and pushed up against a hard cold floor. Someone had spread her cloak out for her to lay upon. "Easy, now, don't move, yank. " "Ace, how long have I been out cold?" "Couldn't tell you. You crashed after you saw the burn . . . " "Why did you hide it from me. I can take being injured . . . " "The prof. was scared you'd do something crazy . . . " "What does he think I am, stupid?" grumbled Raina, pushing herself up onto one bent elbow. "I'm perfectly capable of mitigating any of my own emotional responses . . . " "You were so shaken up after . . . the experiment . . . " "What's with you all anyway? Don't you trust me?" "Of course we do, Tryn . . . " "Have I changed that much? Must've. I no longer talk like a dictionary, " she muttered. "I wouldn't know how you were like . . . only just met you after that freaking Ranee." "Callom, are you all right? " she asked across the separation. "I'm fine," he replied, trying to sound brave. "I'm sorry I got you all into this mess. You should have tried to escape while you could." "We couldn't just leave you . . . " snapped Ace. "That's not our style . . . " "Don't be ridiculous, Vitreum," said the Doctor. "You saved our lives, remember." "How can you be so sure that the Rani's experiment didn't include some other more sinister manipulation? She could have subconsciously reprogrammed me with her experiment . . . " Callom and the Doctor exchanged glances. "I checked yuir mind," said the Scots boy. "It's about . . . the same as before." "After all, aren't you and the lad psychically bonded?" pointed out the Doctor. "The way my powers have been failing me lately, no one can be sure . . . " "I should know ye by nau . . . " began Callom. "No lad, she's got you there," said the Doctor. "We cannot be sure that the experiment didn't alter her powers. After all, her DNA structure has been reconfigured." Raina again felt the searing pain afflicting her thigh. Already her body struggled to heal the injury, but it was working overtime. Blackness seeped over her vision once again. Her friend's voices receded into the distance. The last few days had been some of the most physically traumatic for Raina. Most of the time she weaved in and out of a comatose state, like a swimmer resurfacing from beneath a smothering sea. She didn't want to wake from the strange half dreams and snug darkness that felt so comfortable. Half dreams separated out as her mind paged through the memories. Even the memories themselves seemed mostly fictional. Memories of intense physical and mental pain mingled with images of Callom's frightened face begging her to live. Visions of the Rani's smiling austere triumph as she extracted the very blueprints of Raina's life. And tried to warp them to her reality. Yet had she really succeeded? Hadn't Callom seized the formula at the last moment, teleporting to safety? How had he escaped her biological snares? The Time Lord called the Doctor must have helped Callom. The Doctor and his companion Ace. Showing up in the nick of time by some inexplicable coincidence. Horrible pain wracked her body again after she felt the radiation of the Time Wind penetration. Radiation riddling every cell of her body. Nevertheless, she'd been brought back from the brink of nonexistence in the physical sense. Horrible pain spread across each bone and muscle, once torn apart and re-knitted into a new blueprint. A blueprint chosen at random from a seemingly endless universe of possibilities.  
  
"Raina!"  
  
A voice seemed such a long way off to the geologist, as if she were atop a high mountain. Yet now it felt as if she were at the floor of a huge subterranean cistern, pitch black.  
  
"C'mon girl! Wake up... you're got to wake up!"  
  
"Please Raina... wake up!" pleaded a much higher voice.  
  
"Callom," she answered weakly. Her eyes opened to a sterilely lit room. Two blurred shapes sat at the far wall behind dancing lines of light. "Did they hurt you?" she croaked.  
  
"Steady now, Yank," muttered Ace, who supported her shoulders with her hands. At least she was on the same side of the dancing beams as Raina.  
  
"Doctor, what's going on?" demanded Raina as she struggled to rise.  
  
"Don't try to get up," he responded.  
  
"What do you mean..." she began, until a jarring shaft seemed to pierce her leg as she shifted it. "Aa!" she cried. "What's happened to my legs? Why does it hurt to move them?"  
  
"Please, dinnae look!" begged Callom.  
  
Raina did look, in spite of herself. Fighting the protesting Ace, she whipped aside the cloth that covered her leg. A long black mark ran down her right thigh and calf, near the knee. Charred cloth was melted into the burned flesh, quite near the muscle itself. "By the Author," she choked. "They stole my leg! Those accursed misbegotten monsters stole my leg!"  
  
"I'm sorry," began Ace.  
  
"No, don't feel sorry," snapped Raina. "At least I have two legs to stand on... if I ever stand again."  
  
"Dinna say that!" cried Callom. Raina's mind whirled with all the memories. At last she'd straightened out the sequence. Now she rested with her head propped up on one hand, elbow resting on the floor.  
  
"So how do we get out of here?" asked Ace to the Doctor in the cell across from theirs.  
  
"Sh, I'm thinking," he hissed.  
  
"Better think a wee bit faster then, Doctor," cautioned Callom. "That mechanical salt shaker's coming back."  
  
"Doctor, how precisely do the Karakulians move? Those machines" asked Raina from her position on the floor.  
  
"Electromagetic levitation," muttered the Time Lord.  
  
"If only we can disrupt that power," she whispered.  
  
"Yes, that's it!" exclaimed the Doctor, leaping off his haunches. Excitedly he popped his hat back upon his head. "I've got it!"  
  
"Come on Professor, let's have it now," insisted Ace.  
  
"Callom, can you use your special powers to make a Karakulian think I'm outside the bars and not inside?"  
  
"Yes, but what good will my power work on a machine?"  
  
"The Karakulian Collector isn't a mere machine. It's a cybernetic organism. A fusion of flesh and fabricated circuits."  
  
"I get it," said Callom. "I can affect something that has a mind."  
  
"You or I will be ready to blind the Karakulian when we convince it to open the electron repulsor bars. Then one of us grabs it from behind..."  
  
Hurriedly the quartet settled down when they saw the Karakulian glide into the hallway. Once between their two cells it stopped and leveled its eye stalk at the incapacitated Raina on the floor. It electronically requested, "Remain clear of the bars, female inferiors..."  
  
This was not quite the Doctor's plan, with the practical Karakulian totally ignoring him and Callom. Yet Raina said, "Well, I can't walk. You'll have to come in and get me out yourself."  
  
With a pressure of its claw, the Karakulian touched the force beam control. Silently the Doctor noticed how it did this.  
  
"Hey!" shouted a voice behind it. It seemed that Callom was outside the dancing beams of light!  
  
In confusion the Karakulian collector bleeped. Just long enough for Ace to grab the casing without being seen. Raina tossed her cloak over the top of the Karakulian.  
  
"I can't hold this wretched thing!" shouted Ace. The Doctor helplessly stared as the Karakulian fired wildly, blue sparks flying.  
  
Desperately, Raina grabbed the base of the machine, holding her knife in her other hand. . Anger and hatred exploded inside her brain. Raina could only touch the baseplate, yet all her new found hatred and anger flowed through her fingers. She had sought to prise open teh panel,and rip the wires apart to short out the electromagnetic repulsor unit drive... but why did she suddenly feel the energy pass from her to it? It was as if her own body's em field suddenly spiked, then flared into a supernova of power.  
  
"Move-ment . . . ii-mm-parrd," droned the Karakulian, its voice slowing to a grunt.  
  
Ace shuddered as the Karakulian stopped dead. Small screachings were the only sound it now made. "All right, Yank!" she cried, slapping Raina's hand in a high-five.  
  
"I . . . I don't know what I did," stammered Raina. Astonished, she stared at her palms.  
  
"Whatever you did, Yank . . . thanks."  
  
"Ace, turn that control to the left," instructed the Doctor when it was all over. Callom rushed over to Raina and hugged her tight. Wearily she patted his head and assured him she'd be all right.  
  
"That's done it," declared the Doctor, bringing both palms together in a single smack. "Now. Let's get it open."  
  
Callom shrank back. "Och! Ye sure the creature isn't jest deceiving us? Like playing possum?"  
  
"Can I borrow a knife?"  
  
Reluctantly, Callom reached into his sock and pulled out his skeindu. Taking the shortened dirk, the Doctor gingerly pried into the crack between the domed top and the grating. Raina helped swing up the lid, and they saw the fused bits of biological cells merged together with circuitry.  
  
Corners of her mouth drawing down, Raina shuddered. "So that's what a Karakulian looks like."  
  
"Yes," the Doctor sighed. "A living brain fused to modern circuitry. Which gives me an idea. Help me get this out of here... and we can make use of a tried and true method..." he whispered, voice low. Using Raina's cloak, they reached into the casing and bundled the squirming mass out. Quickly she wrapped a cord round its top.  
  
"You mean there's a wee beastie inside that machine?" asked Callom from behind. "Like some sort of a brain or a gremlin?" All he and Ace had seen was the Time Lord and the geologist hefting a small bundle out of the Karakulian. Bits of electronics flew out, Ace and Rayna working hard to clear the inner workings of the mechanism out.  
  
Turning to everyone, the Doctor announced, "Step one of my plan is accomplished. Now for the next play. One of us lucky souls must get inside the casing and play dress-up."  
  
"Raina could get inside," suggested Ace. "Then we could push her."  
  
"Och, can I?" asked Callom, sensing Raina's emotions of loathing repulsion at the very thought. "I'm the wee lad remember?"  
  
"No way, shrimp," said Ace.  
  
"I don't see a problem," said Raina. "He'll be safest inside there if the Karakulians fire upon us. Besides, he can manipulate the controls. I mean you did jury rig it..."  
  
"Yes," the doctor muttered, twisting wires and circuits together. "I removed the prime brain and control unit. Now this connection here will work like a makeshift joystick Callom. You just twist this toggle here to go left, and this to go right. The pedal on teh floor controls speed..."  
  
"Okay Professor," sighed Ace. "Whatever you say."  
  
"Time to try for size," announced the Doctor. He made a stirrup with his hands to boost the young Scot inside. Holding Raina's hand, he slid into the seat.  
  
"Och, this is strange," he exclaimed from inside. The curved walls of the Karakulian casing rose around him. Eerily it felt the right size for him. He sat on the bottom, holding the improvised control unit the Doctor handed down to him. A small screen flared into life, and the doctor explained it could show was was immediately otuside the small tank.  
  
"We're closing the lid now," said Raina. Callom's world became dark temporarily, only illuminated by the doctor's improvised LCD screen before his frace.  
  
"Kind of like a tank in here," he shouted. Callom grasped the control box, twiddlign with the tiny control rods. Slowly the casing slid forwards, toward the door. "We may have to push him from the back," said Ace, sliding around behind the travel machine and pushing it out the door. Helping Raina to walk, the Doctor followed.  
  
"See anything?" asked Ace.  
  
"No," came the reply, in her mind.  
  
"Here, Ace. Raina and I will walk ahead of you two, like we're prisoners."  
  
Ace halted Callom, letting the Doctor and Raina pass. Hand under Raina's right arm, the Doctor and the explorers moved out into the corridor. Callom managed to move the travel casing as Ace pushed from behind.  
  
The real test came when a Karakulian rolled down the corridor toward them. "You don't have to push, you infernal machine!" shouted the Doctor.  
  
"Query, moving experiment subjects is not authorized?" asked the new Karakulian.  
  
"New authorization," grated Callom, swirlign his mind into an illusion, and hurling it into the cybernetic brain cells of the Karakulian Collector.  
  
"Perfect," muttered Ace behind him. *** PART SIX: SUDDEN GROWTH  
  
A haze fogged his brain. He woke up running, ripping the sleeves of a shirt that had suddenly grown too tight. All Callom remembered at that second was the impulse to run like crazy. Strangely, the passages he ran through were silent. Not a threat in sight. Gleaming metal seemed to stretch for miles like some sectioned human gerbil tube. Rounding one section bend, Callom spotted a familiar blue box. Staggering, Callom slid in the isomorphic key pressed into his hand an eternity ago. It took him forever to cross the brightly illuminated flight -deck to reach the lounge. Wearily he collapsed onto a chair.  
  
Safe for the moment, in the humming sterile atmosphere and soft white lights, he relaxed. Then, feeling the bind of his clothes, that seemed strangely tight, he tottered to his feet. Someone approached from the side. Just on the edge of his vision there was the doorway. Who could be in here with him? Startled, he backed away. As suddenly as the face appeared, it vanished. Stealthily, Callom crept towards the "doorway." Heart pounding in the silence, he lunged forward.  
  
Instantly the strange figure leapt into view again. Torn clothing and long hair were smudged with dirt. Its chest rose and fell with each labored breath. Callom wondered who this man was, strangely dressed in a half torn shirt and inadequately short kilt.  
  
"Nae! It canna be . . ." denied a tenor voice.  
  
The character was none other than Callom himself.  
  
Frightened, he froze there, gaping at his unfamiliar reflection. Long wavy hair came to his shoulders. No more were his cheeks rotund from baby fat. Now they'd stretched into the hard lines and angles of a man's. With shaking fingers he traced his firm strong jaw and nose. Taken aback he studied his enlarged strong hands. "It--it's jest na possible! How, by all the veterans a Culloden?"  
  
Only images of a curious ray fired at him gave him any possible explanation. Didn't Raina say something about a Growth Accelerator back on the stolen ship they landed here in? This seemed the only logical explanation.  
  
Remembering his captured friends, Callom snapped out of shock. It seemed best to accept his situation, and benefit from his unnatural growth spurt. How many years did the machine add to his age? Carefully he contemplated his body, now rounded with muscle. Judging from the height of the door, which he guessed was two and a half meters, Callom approximated his present height was 190 centimeters. His head was twelve centimeters shy of the mirror's top.  
  
"That biology book, said something about hormones," he muttered, summoning up the chapters of the book Raina had given him on earth months ago. "Testosterone making the muscles grow and the bones shoot up like a weed. Gotta be at least seven years tacked on t' ma age! Na, that's crazy!""  
  
"But what do I do nau?" he asked himself. What indeed? There were few options. He asked himself what his friends would do. Then threw out the answers. Strange thoughts filled his imagination, as he suddenly fantasized himself dashing off to the rescue like a hero in an epic poem.  
  
"Wait!" he stopped himself. "What can I do? I may be stronger, but I dinna ken if strength is enau . . ."  
  
Growth spurts. That chapter in the biology text flashed through his clearing mind. If his body had matured, could his brain have along with it? Did his powers increase in strength as well?  
  
"Whatever I do, I canna verra well go about get up like this," he decided, clicking his tongue at his reflection with distaste. "I look a sight. Na' worthy of a McLaren."  
  
"Now where is that chamber Raina mentioned? Somewhere . . . ow!"  
  
He winced, and grabbed his hip. He'd bruised it running in his grayout. And starved from the last few hours, just when had he last eaten? "Ugh. Have nae the strength to get there."  
  
Slowly he squeezed his eyes shut. Wished he could get there in an instant. His mind wandered as he thought about the passages he'd have to pass through to get there...  
  
A wave of nausea made him reel, and he blinked open his eyes. Then rubbed them. "Begorra!" he exclaimed. All around him rose racks and racks of clothes.  
  
He had teleported. Without a booster module! Within the confines of the TARDIS. Before it had been so difficult to travel even a few feet. Callom stared a few meters ahead of himself, and concentrated. As if a switch fell, he felt the same nausea and reality blinked to the new scene around him. "Amazin! Ha, ha! This'll be just th' thing!"  
  
Each time the nausea grew less. "Must be like flexing a muscle. Gets easier each time."  
  
Slipping out his knife, he cut away the remains of his outfit. Reached for a long sleeved shirt. Pulled the loose garment over his head and shoulder. It was one of those puffy sleeved ones with an open neck that showed his well muscled chest. Oh well, he'd have to make do. His eyes fell on several strips of tartan hanging out of a cabinet drawer. Unfortunately the tartan he saw was not McLaren, but MacLaren. Something inside him compelled him to wear tartans. It would inspire him to courage. A connection with the past that would not be severed.  
  
A few minutes search yielded a long bolt of Black watch plaid. Callom consulted his memory. "Da was in the Scot's guard. I'd be too. Suppose I'm entitled t' wear regimental Tartan. I'm no exactly civilian if I'm goin' into battle nau."  
  
"Guess I'll have to do this the old fashioned way," he sighed. Intently he wrapped the swath around his waist. It was the only tartan he could find that would fit in such a hurry. Around and around his waist, then tucked in under one shoulder. Over his chest he flipped the end, and fastened it there with his clansmen pin. Just like he remembered some Highlanders did in history. Finally he slipped on a beautiful thick leather belt he scrounged up, with an ornate silver buckle.  
  
The ends of his now long hair fell into his eyes. Grunting, he twisted some of it into small braids. Some fibers drawn from the plaid he used to tie off the braids out of his way. Further digging yielded leather boots and grey socks.  
  
Surveying himself in the mirror he nodded. Then trotted off to look for some sort of weapons. One shortened highland dirk was woefully inadequate to tackle Karakulians. Rummaging through cabinets he found an eighteenth century cutlass, several fencing rapiers, and even two mighty claymores. No doubt all were obtained from some past journey. In the cabinet there were also several antiquated pistols, minus ammunition.  
  
"Great snakes, ye'd think this Doctor wuild have somthin better than pirate stuff," he complained, holstering a full sized dirk at his hip. Finding a second leather belt, he slung it across his chest to carry the better of the two claymores.  
  
He 'ported to the chemistry lab. There he found Ace's kit. He wasn't much up on chemistry, but he'd recalled seeing her cook up Nitro 9. Several canisters were stacked, ready for fill. "Ah, tha's guid enau fer me!" he laughed, stacking them into his shoulder bag.  
  
*** Ace despairingly glanced towards the lab. She had tucked herself into an alcove between a counter and a large cabinet just inside. The lab was an enormous space, dingy and dark with cold metal walls and floors. All that illuminated the darkness were the blinking lights on squat Karakulians and the instrument panels. Raina lay stunned, fixed in the sites of a Karakulian extermination gun. If Ace dared reveal herself by attacking, they'd shoot Raina. In the few short hours Ace had begun to grow fond of this erratic scientist with remarkable compassion.  
  
"Warn-ing!" grated the gold Karakulian suddenly. "Heat patterns detected in proximity to laboratory."  
  
"Suspect AL-I-en female in vicinity . . . "  
  
She swallowed hard, and searched for her Nitro-9. Yet there was no more. Raina still lay on a rubberized mat, her hands pressed flat as she tried to push herself up. Anger burned in her eyes as she glared up at the Karakulian scientist. However, she was unable to rise because of the restraining clamps.  
  
Clutching the handle of her baseball bat, she gritted her determination. One last shot at them. She didn't know how yet. Many times Ace had rescued the Doctor. The stakes had now doubled, for he and the Earthling were both captives.  
  
Where had their plan gone wrong?  
  
***  
  
They had reached the labs of the Karakulians, only to have to split up. One way went the males, and the other the females. Callom and the Doctor'd been discovered, and immobilized. Far away in some lab they were taken. It seemed the best escapes had been exhausted. Now Ace struggled desperately to avoid capture, and free her friends. To do what? Get recaptured?  
  
Slowly she made a move forward. They weren't scanning, just now. Again she glanced at the Karakulian covering Raina. Intently it set it probes for another scan. "Now or never," she whispered to herself.  
  
Immediately a brawny hand covered her mouth. Reality blinked out of existence. She struggled against a strong captor. It felt humanoid. Reflexively she jabbed her elbow backwards to hit solid flesh. Whoever it was, she knocked the wind out of them. Then ran like crazy in the opposite direction.  
  
Mind racing, she suddenly realized. Who on earth here was human? Didn't the Karakulians capture everyone on the space ship?  
  
"Wait there, lass!" hissed a voice in her ear, gripping her arm.  
  
"Let me go," she almost cried aloud, dashing down the hallways.  
  
Just in front of her, out of nowhere, appeared a figure. Six feet, wrapped in a green and black toga. Long blond hair hung around his shoulders, and he clutched a long-sword. "Ace! Wait. It's me," he whispered, clutching his stomach in pain.  
  
"Who the blazes are you?" she demanded, backing away.  
  
"It's me I tell ye! Callom McLaren."  
  
"H-Callom? No way," she gasped, still keeping her distance. Sickness twisted her stomach. Somehow she'd become nauseous. "How? "  
  
"That growth accelerator. They fired that device at me, and I grew. I swear t' ye . . . "  
  
"A-lien de-tect-ed! Pur-sue, pur-sue!"  
  
"Och, ye gotta believe me!" The stranger grabbed her wrist with lightening speed, and pulled her along behind him. "C'mon, lass! We gotta get otta here!"  
  
"What, and leave the Doc and Tryn? Are you crazy?"  
  
"I've gotta plan!"  
  
Ace couldn't help but dash behind the man. Sure he was humanoid. But how in the name of Time and Space could he be who he claimed? Callom was a thirteen-year-old boy, and this person was at least twenty. Nevertheless, his tenor voice had the same thick accent. Also, the clothes he was wearing were sure not futuristic, like any Thal from Skaro would wear. Not even twentieth century. He looked like Duncan MacLeod or someone straight out of the movie Highlander, with his loose peasant shirt and the tartan swath wrapped around his waist and over his shoulder. A sturdy thick leather belt was fastened around his waist, with a second strap going across his shoulder like a pirate's sword belt. Metal pins gleamed in the scant lighting of the corridor. She recalled they looked exactly like Callom's McLaren clansmen pins he wore on his kilt. But why was he wearing Black Watch?  
  
They ducked behind a low panel. Just how had they come here?  
  
"Rest easy," he whispered, propping her up against the wall.  
  
"I just don't get it," she muttered. "How did I get here? Out of that lab?"  
  
"I'm sorry if ye feel sick. I guess mebbe tha's a side effect of 'porting. Should go way in a few minnits."  
  
"Ugh! I feel like I wanna hurl."  
  
"Jest dinna hurl on ma tartan," he joked. She saw him reach into a leather shoulder bag, and produce a canteen. "Try and get some of this doon ye. It may help."  
  
"I was just about to rescue them when you botched it," she snapped, between sips.  
  
"I saved yuir life, lass. How inna name of St. Brigid were ye goin t' save em without the right weapons?"  
  
"Okay. You gotta point." Grimly she shook her head. "If I only had some Nitro-9 about now. . ."  
  
"Is this what yuir lookin for?" he asked, opening his shoulder bag. Several deodorant cans were stacked inside.  
  
"Oh brill," she sighed, feeling better for the first time in hours. "You're okay after all, Callom . . ."  
  
"So I take it you believe me?"  
  
"Who else would know where to get my Nitro-9?" Nevertheless, he still sensed she was not totally convinced.  
  
"Where's the Doctor hid? I saw Raina in there, right enau. But I didnae see him."  
  
"He's in another lab," she breathed, trying valiantly not to throw up.  
  
"I managed to get this away from them," he said, pulling out the Doctor's map.  
  
"Before they nicked him?"  
  
"It was sitting in a Karakulian lab. I dinna ken how to read it though. Still, I figured out the scale."  
  
Ace took it from him, glanced at it. Then leaned her head back agaisnt the wall. "Uh, the room's still spinning," she muttered. Still she was a little shaky.  
  
"What do ye suppose they're doing to em?"  
  
"Heard those creeps saying that they wanted to drain his brain or something."  
  
"If the Doctor's a deadly enemy, won't they jest kill him?"  
  
"Eventually, they'll off him, I guess."  
  
"But what about Raina? I saw her pinned down under some ray."  
  
"They think that she's a good specimen. I think from what they were saying, that she's gonna be dissected or something."  
  
"Och! No while I'm around, they don't!"  
  
"I think that's what they did to the crew of the ship. They must have them down here somewhere, as guinea pigs for their experiments."  
  
"Didn't the Doctor say these Karakulians conquered other planets?"  
  
"Yes. But these Karakulians here have been left behind as a kind of . . . Blast, what's the word?"  
  
"Rear guard."  
  
"Thanks."  
  
"I wonder. Were those Karakulians the ones that made that ray gun in the first place?"  
  
"What ray gun?"  
  
"I mean that weapon that stopped the Cerise, and the TARDIS. Raina said that the ship reported flashing lights at one time. Before the madness started."  
  
"Great, but if it's the same weapon, why didn't we get paranoid?"  
  
He ignored her question. "Why they're wasting time with that Growth Accelerator when they could build one of their own wi' their know-how?"  
  
"Beats me."  
  
"I was jest thinking, lass."  
  
"What about?"  
  
"That crew. D'ye suppose that they all died? Or some may have survived an been brought here, mebbe?"  
  
"Cripes!" she exclaimed. "How can you sit there and ask naff questions while Prof and your friend are in it deep?"  
  
"It might help us figure out what they're doin t' the Doctor. For all we know the answer could come from it."  
  
"You and your stupid daydreaming!"  
  
"At least I'm thinkin about this . . . "  
  
"Like I'm not? Look kid, there's times for asking questions, and time for acting! This isn't the time to be sittin on our butts chatterin!"  
  
"Raina was alway teaching me to ask questions, an make observations!" argued Callom. "Tha's what a good scientist does."  
  
"You ain't no Einstein, squirt."  
  
"Neither are ye, lass. Don't ye want t' get to the bottom o' this mystery?"  
  
"We can do that after the Professor and your friend are free, if we can get them away from those Karakulians."  
  
"Oh, all right," he grumbled. "But I still think..."  
  
"Look, I'm still older than you. And I know what I'm doing. We'll get the Professor to brainstorm later. Clear?"  
  
"Ye may be older, but can ye teleport?" he asked her. "I ken see what ye wanna do. Jest barge in there wi explosives blazin . . ."  
  
"Have you got a better idea?"  
  
"As a matter of fact I gotta plan. That is, if ye want to listen to a kid like me."  
  
"Okay, let's hear your brilliant plan then,"  
  
"I was thinking, we cuild use some strategy. Wi ma teleportin and yuir nitro-9."  
  
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"  
  
"I cuild read yuir mind, telepath that I am, but tha's no proper."  
  
"Oh dry up," she said, grabbing his shoulder. Her fingers felt the soft tartan swath draped over it. It was still hard to believe he was Callom McLaren, but their verbal sparring was starting to convince her. That same wisecracking he had. "What's on your mind?"  
  
"If I create a diversion, ye can get in and free Raina."  
  
"How are you doing that?"  
  
"By ma teleportin."  
  
"I thought that knocked you silly. That's why we had to carry you before . . ."  
  
"No anymore. Ma powers have increased. I can teleport guid enau wi'out tiring. At least not so fast. Those Karakulians won' know what him em."  
  
***  
  
Raina writhed. Just the slightest movement sent pain into her leg. Still the burn had not yet healed. Even with her quick healing abilities it could take days for such a severe burn to begin to mend. Pieces of her tissues had been sampled and placed into culture dishes. A few blasts from the Growth Accelerator were applied, and the tissue slowly grew.  
  
Raina wished they'd test it on her burn. At least to facilitate the healing process. But they were instead testing her response to pain. Needles were inserted into her leg, near her nerve endings. Each time she'd flinch, the pain would register in a computer database. So she remained still. Escaping was out of the question too, if she tried to run, the Karakulian gun would exterminate her. And with a lame leg, there was little chance even with her quick reflexes, that she could escape alive this time.  
  
"Studied in-dicate that female's response to pain is lower than first hu- manoid spec-i-mine."  
  
"Psi-scans in-dicate negative. Fe-male is psi-null."  
  
"Scans on Doc-tor indicate index of 5 on psi-scale. Pro-ceed-ing to total drain of rel-e-vant know-elge."  
  
However, back in the cell she had somehow crippled the Karakulian. She had stunned it into submission. That wasn't a psycho blast. A psycho blast utilized psionic energy to send an overload into its system. Channeling her anger and hatred, Raina had grabbed the baseplate. Reflexively she'd been attempting to psi-blast the Karakulians mind. Then the Karakulian simply stopped moving.  
  
What had she done? If the Rani had done some genetic engineering, what was the affect of it? It seemed as if her instincts were awakened, and she could sense things few otehrs could. Her body seemed to be healing at a phenomenal rate now, far and above what these injuries woul dnormal take to heal. What new powers existed with this body? She was able to communicate with Callom. It could just be a psionic bond with him. Change had limited her sensitivity, similar to deafening someone's hearing. When she could use her telepathic powers, she had none. Some Earthlings were psionic. The Rani had said that hundreds of years after her generation, the previous species had psychic abilities. They communicated solely through chemical transmitted messages through the atmosphere. In fact, many Earthlings, the more primitive types, could actually absorb psychic energies and dampen them in the centuries to come.  
  
By the twety fourth century, the Rani had said that Earthling civilization encompassed many star systems. System by system they had colonized a stellar cluster. In some of those systems, the government set up special preserves. Planets on which members of previous evolutions were kept, as a genetic race-bank. A living library set to represent the past, so the ruling species would not forget from whence they came. Was Raina now a psycho damper? No longer just a normal Earthling? Karakulians moved with Psycho kinetic power. She somehow must have jammed the Karakulian's ability to move, back in the cell. Slowly she reached out with her mind. To reach out to Callom. Through the courtyard of her mind she felt his presence, somewhere close by.  
  
*Raina . . .  
  
*Callom! Are you all right?  
  
*Aye. Ace 'n me r coming to save you 'n the Doctor.  
  
*If you try and come in, they'll shoot me. I've got some sort of booby trap attached . . .  
  
*Ace says she'll try and deal with it. I'll be creatin a distraction. You'll have to slip away with her. . . .  
  
*Where are you now?  
  
*Safe 'n well.  
  
"Where did you say those labs were?"  
  
"I thought you knew, sport," she said, hands on her hips. He streaked past her in a blur of black and green, almost sliding like a runner into home plate. "Come back here."  
  
"I dinna remember the coordinates," he admitted.  
  
Ace sighed. Shook her head. "It's that way."  
  
Callom narrowed his eyes. Stopped still. "Sh. I hear something. One of them Karakulians is coming our way."  
  
"Come on, man, don't hang about!" she cried, grabbing his arm, and pulling him along for a change.  
  
Begorra, could she run fast! This eighteen-year-old gal tugged a Highland Scot after her down a bare metal corridor. Her Doc Martins pounded faster and faster, followed by the thump of his rough leather shoes and argyle socks. In the backpack slung over her shoulder rattled the cans of Nitro-9 he had brought her.  
  
Shadows slid down the wall ahead of them. Ace threw her arm back, pressing him against the wall next to her. Five tense minutes they pressed close together, listening for the eerie soundless gliding of the mini-tanks.  
  
"Nearly had us there," she whispered. "Good going, kid."  
  
"Feels like they dinna ken we're here."  
  
"They have an infrared scanning device," said Ace. "I saw it in the lab. They'll catch us sooner or later."  
  
"How much further to the labs?"  
  
"About fifty meters," she said, glancing at the plastic map.  
  
Now and then Callom would catch himself looking at her. A funny hot flush would rise in his cheeks. That type of looking where he found himself watching the sway of her hips as she ran. Or how her breasts curved under her T-shirt. How her thighs smoothly filled out her spandex leggings. Physically she was really nice to look at. What he'd call, bonnie. He was uncomfortable with these thoughts. Yet he realized somehow they must be part of the pushed maturation. An overwhelming instinctual attraction to the opposite sex.  
  
He sensed from her thoughts that she was looking at him similarly. Such thoughts were difficult to screen out. They were so loud underneath her conscious ones, despite the urgency of their situation. Here they were, trying to save two people's lives, and they were thinking of how attractive the other looked. Using her as a mirror, he caught a visual image of how she saw him. Peculiar. Mirrors can lie, but a person's perception told him volumes. Callom looked great in those tartans. She thought the way his kilt swirled around him as he walked was . . . well, sensual. In her decade, men with long hair were common. He'd pulled his back into a braid like Johnny Tremain.  
  
Callom was impressed. She actually had read that book. The same lass who didn't bother reading old stuff, off a scholastic list. In contrast, he devoured every classic he could lay hands on.  
  
Scolding himself, he struggled to block out the pictures he was receiving. As a side effect, his telepathic discernment was increased. What his culture referred as the scrying ability or discernment.  
  
"Hey, kid! Wake up!"  
  
"Sorry. Where's the Doctor bein held?"  
  
"In a lab near Raina's. . ." *** 


	4. A Growing Madness Part 3

Disclaimer: The characters of Dr. Who and Ace are property of BBC. The character of Raina MacLaren and Callom are property of me. My characters mean now harm to the show. This is written out of enjoyment for a creative show... and to preserve a good sf time travel saga!  
  
A Growing Madness  
  
Part 3:EXPERIMENTATIONS!  
  
Theresa E. Meyers  
  
Written 1996, revised 1998  
  
"Just how many times before had this happened?" the Doctor asked himself. He could hear their grating voices planning havoc. A diabolical plan. Which he had walked straight into with his young companions.  
  
"I must be getting old," he complained. "Happens when you reach nine hundred fifty-five!" He couldn't move a millimeter. A drug attenuated to his unique nervous system kept him rigid, yet conscious.  
  
From a strange tank he saw the tendril brain forms of the lead Karakulians drifting. Their control Collectors moved about in the haze, fitting the Doctor into restraints. Loathing filled his mind when he regarded the creatures that thought themselves far superior to anything that did not possess their form or intellect.  
  
There was a good reason why he endured this. He wanted to discover their plans. Sometimes that meant stepping into the lion's den to hear them roar. Still, he'd counted on being able to get out alive and unscathed. A slim hope still existed: Ace was not in their clutches. This eighteen-year-old human saved his life time and again. Funny how much he'd come to rely upon his companions over the aeons. He could always count on his companions doing the exact opposite of what he said.  
  
The Theileria Minor colonists. If he could have saved them, it would have been a miracle. Most likely, they were Karakulians themselves now. Of all the times to land on Karakul, it had to be when the Karakulians were just developing space flight. To think Karakul's sun would be destroyed in a few measly years from now.  
  
Time was relative. Especially to a Time Lord.  
  
Why did the Karakulians want a human invention like the Growth Accelerator? Surely they could develop one from their own technology.  
  
He was figuring this riddle out when they caught him.  
  
"Test results on first human subject?"  
  
"Test positive. Aging accelerated significantly. Test subject was destroyed after termination of experiment . . . "  
  
Hearing these words, the Doctor felt a stab of guilt. Pity about Callom. Such a young boy. He could recall the last despairing look on the lad's face as the Karakulians guns blazed around him. This timid boy seemed capable of such sudden bravery when he grabbed the Growth Accelerator short hours ago. Or when he helped them to save Vitreum from the Rani's genetic experiments.  
  
"Tests results of alien female indicate strong physical constitution."  
  
"Prepare cell cultures."  
  
Perhaps the geologist would survive. She was a strong creature. Humans always survived somehow. Just trying to figure out her genetic code would occupy even a Karakulian. It was a certainty that they never encountered her species before. At least not in his experience. Adaptable self mutating DNA was a rarity.  
  
Commencing scans on Doctor. Query. Is Accelerator functioning to specified parameters?"  
  
"Affirmative. Cellular cultures of Doctor accelerated 1.5 per-cent."  
  
"What . . . do you want of me?" he managed to croak.  
  
"You will be silent, Time Lord. You among these creatures is perhaps even worth speaking to. But you will not succeed this time. You are under our control..." hissed the speaking units of the Karakulian scientist closest to him.  
  
"If I'm to die, I must know."  
  
"Negative. You will continue to function. Your mind will be of use to us. Growth Accelerator has increased metabolization of a drug in your nervous system. Soon you will be under our control. All your knowledge will be shared willingly..."  
  
"What in the Twelve Galaxies would you want with that device? Surely you've developed one of your own . . . "  
  
"Human Growth Accelerator tech-no-logy is not de-pendent upon the absence of radiation, Time Lord."  
  
"Aha, so your ambient radiation is stopping your experiments?"  
  
"Radiation halts accelerator's process. Human devices have overcome this limitation by using radiation as a power source."  
  
"So what are you going to do with it, now that you've got it?"  
  
"Growth accelerators will speed up process of Karakulian embryo production. New genetic material will stop spread of the virus."  
  
"And what about me? Surely you aren't gong to all this trouble just to kill me?"  
  
"Your regenerative properties will be in-fused into our Karakulians."  
  
"My regenerative properties? You know about them? How?"  
  
No answer. Horror rose in him as he realized, "That ship . . . was a trap to bring me here?"  
  
"Affirmative," came a harsh clatter that passed for a Karakulian laugh. "And you as a primitive lesser being were drawn here..."  
  
"I'm flattered. I didn't think you Karakulians were capable of such a brilliant plan," he croaked. "I knew that device that stopped me was the same as what stopped the Cerise!"  
  
"One of your old nemesis divulged your location."  
  
"The Rani?" he gasped.  
  
"Correct. In exchange for information gleaned from you, she will assist us in the rebuilding of our world."  
  
"Now it makes sense," the Doctor mumbled grimly. "Only she would have had such a contingincy plan." ***  
  
Explosions rocked the corridors. Raina pushed herself to a sitting position, despite the pain in her leg. One of the Karakulians, the furthest from her, vanished into a smoke cloud. Only seconds later, there was a blinding flash that painted the dingy lab into a flare of light. Lab counters and devices were momentarily visible. Raina sniffed the by- products of a nitroglycerin explosion.  
  
"Unknown explosives!" screeched one Karakulian, from within its vat.  
  
For a moment the Karakulian Collector unit guarding Raina turned away. It regarded the lead Karakulian scientist, bubbling away in its mobile vat, "Query! Determine nature of explosion!"  
  
"Eyarrgh!" something screamed at the top of its lungs.  
  
BOOM!  
  
Choking smoke exploded just outside the lab doorway. Pulling herself with her hands, she began to crawl from beneath the scanner.  
  
"HALT. Do not move!"  
  
Glass shards sliced up Raina's nerves as she crawled another two inches. The geologist shivered, trying to ignore the searing sensation.  
  
"Ye canna get me, ye Sassenach machines!" shouted the same tenor voice in the dark. There were yet another flash and an explosion as a bank of computers bit the dust. Collectors sizzled and exploded, leaving their master defenseless.  
  
Suddenly the Karakulian unit standing over Raina screeched, "AM under at- tack! Small female alien... ASSIST YOUR CONTROLLER!"  
  
"Not likely!" shouted a female voice. Light flashed off her baseball bat as she hammered the Karakulian. Its ray blazed wildly toward Raina. Fortunately she had moved precious inches out of its line of fire.  
  
"Ace!" cried Raina. "I've never been so glad to see anyone!"  
  
"Steady on, Yank," she said, dropping to her haunches by the geologist. "I'll get you out of here in no time flat!"  
  
"There's a pain... Ow! A pain sensitizer! On . . . my leg!"  
  
"Got it covered," she said, ripping out the wires. "Are you okay?"  
  
"I will be now."  
  
Mayhem erupted all around the two women. Two other Karakulian collector units raced back and forth, guns blazing. They sought an enemy that was in many places at once. In the blaze of their tazers Raina sighted a male figure wielding a long sword. He hoisted the weapon over his head, and crashed it down on computer terminal after terminal. Before the Karakulians could shoot, he'd vanish in a swirl of light.  
  
Raina could swear the sword looked like a claymore, an ancient Scots weapon. Such a sword took a great deal of strength to wield. War cries in Gaelic echoed from every direction.  
  
"Let's get you out of here," Ace said, wrapping Raina's arm around her shoulders. "Can you stand?"  
  
"Painfully," she gasped, tottering to her feet.  
  
"HALT! Do Not Move!"  
  
"Blast!" gritted Ace.  
  
Another tank swung into view. Right beside the Karakulian covering them, the stranger appeared. He placed the point of his claymore at the base of the tank. With a mighty heave, he used it to lever the Karakulian onto its side. Helplessly it toppled, crying, as the glass shattered, spilling its occupant onto the floor. Raina freed herself from Ace. Dropped to her knees, pressing hands against the Karakulian's sensor plates. Like before, she focused her anger and pain. Till the Karakulian no longer moved. Ace swung round. The first Karakulian Collector swung its tazer round on her. Beside it appeared the man. He pressed his sword into the ground. Using the weapon as a support, he planted both his booted feet into the creature's side. Shoved. Like a hockey puck the Karakulian hurtled across the room. Right in the path of the second Karakulian. For a minute the second Karakulian swerved. Before it could recover, the two collided. Both exploded on impact in a cascade of sparks. Silence was blissful.  
  
"Callom! Is that you?" asked Raina.  
  
Kilt swirling around his knees, he raced to her side. "Thank goodness yair okay!" he cried, throwing strong arms around her.  
  
She hugged just as firmly. "My, how you've grown!" she exclaimed, drawing back for a second to look at him. All six-foot of solid muscle and bone, clad in warrior's clothes.  
  
"Och, that's nae important nau," he said. His tears spattered her brown hair as she held him tight against herself. "I . . . jest could nae leave ye behind!"  
  
"I hate to bust up this reunion," broke in Ace. "But those Karakulians will figure out what's up, and be swarming all over this place in minutes."  
  
"Aye, we'd better get out of here then," said Callom. "I'll help Raina get away. You get going."  
  
"See you there, sport," she said.  
  
"Be careful, lass," he said, catching hold of her arm before she walked away. For a moment she looked him full in the face, newfound respect and sadness in her eyes. Innocence lost, as she had lost hers years before.  
  
Her jaw trembled as she clenched her lips tightly. "Aren't I always," she snapped, forcing down the emotion betrayed in those brown eyes. Raina couldn't help but notice the nonverbal exchange.  
  
***  
  
No longer could the Doctor speak. Jaw muscles failed to receive the commands from his hazed brain. The drug was taking its full effect. With all the resources of his Time Lord brain he fought, to no avail.  
  
"C-can't talk," he gasped, voice a mere croak of its former self. "N-not really fair. . . is it?"  
  
Dispassionately the Karakulian brains ignored him. No longer was he an enemy, but a test subject. Like the colonists had been, and the Doctor's young Companions. Save Raina, who wasn't all that young. At least from what he knew about her species.  
  
Funny. The Doctor claimed to be close to one thousand years old, and that was a mere fraction of the life spans of a Time Lord. Raina was a human, perhaps altered in some way by the Rani. How long could she hope to live, with the mutations? She claimed to be thirty-six, but what did that matter in the grand scheme of things?  
  
Poor Callom. His life was snuffed out before he could taste the burdens of adulthood. Ace was a girl whose childhood should have been filled with safe happy family memories. All she could recall was the pain and anger toward parents she no longer considered hers. She hated her mother, who was an adorable baby just as Ace had once been. Callom's father, fearful of his son's budding powers, drank. Still the lad loved him.  
  
Vitreum, the scientist who had died helping them escaping the Rani. Who was an outcast and slave in her culture. Because she chose to reject their ways and live without genetic enhancement. Without the comforts of her society on Genome. Forced to endure pain because she cared so much for a lost Scots lad.  
  
How many had died, following him on his aimless wanderings? Adric, the gentle Alzarian with childlike innocence. Or hard edged Sara Kingdom, changing her loyalty after dispatching her own brother. Only to age to death. Katarina, the slave girl from ancient Greece who saved his life. A girl who'd never seen a spaceship, let alone an airlock. Or those countless UNIT men who could never go home after a conflict with aliens invading earth. Their wives would forever wonder why they'd not come home one night for dinner.  
  
There were those whose lives were disrupted by traveling with him. Sarah- Jane the reporter, dumped in South Croyden. His own granddaughter Susan, living in Earth's future with a one-time freedom fighter. The Master stole Nyssa, whose father and home world from her. Or Peri, left to wed a king in a male-dominated society. Tegan, who never became an air hostess as she wanted to.  
  
He realized they were sifting through his multiple lifetimes of memory. And he'd been drowning in the guilt, getting a high. There was no narcotic stronger to a Time Lord than a trip down Memory Lane. Somehow they'd tuned into his brain frequency. That's when he realized there was no drug in his system. If it had been, his Time Lord physiology could have metabolized it by now. Mental control over physical processes were their hallmark. Somehow this affliction was dredging up the guilt and anger from his checked mind, and defeating him. They'd lock his mind in this cage. Force him to give up.  
  
Desperately he fixed his thoughts on the accident in the TARDIS. Just what immobilized it and forced it to dematerialize in space? It would have to be a weapon that could reach into the fourth and fifth dimensions to immobilize a TARDIS. As he recalled, in this time, Karakulians had developed time travel. After all, the Karakulians managed to construct a device similar to the TARDIS, the same device used by two schoolteachers so long ago to get back to 1963.  
  
But the Karakulians now were not those of the twenty-seventh century. At best the Doctor guessed time relative to Earth was twenty second century, judging from the space ship they'd encountered. These Karakulians had developed rudimentary space travel, and had driven the Ehrweyls from the planet. By now, the Ehrweyls must be cowering on some moon far away in space as they struggled to survive. Nagging him foremost was the question, "Why are the Karakulians using a Growth Accelerator developed by humans?"  
  
But the Rani had led them to him. And perhaps had told them about the experimental growth accelerator. Most devices used enzymes to speed up growth of living matter. This was entirely different from bringing alive something inorganic like a volcano or a star. If a being based their system on temporal energy, any rate could be accelerated. Age could be stopped or started. Even time itself could be controlled. At a large energy cost.  
  
That's what made this device different. The Karakulian growth accelerator did work on a temporal principle. But uncontrolled use could lead to rips in the fabric of space time. That's why they secured a device that stimulated cell division by bombarding DNA sequences with a special radiation. The DNA sequences that regulated the end of cell division were targeted. Certain key sequences could be destroyed or stimulated to replicate, thus accelerating cell division through increased protein replication. All without the need for temporal mechanics. At this realization, the Doctor smiled. Despite the drug in his system. At last he was getting somewhere. Of what good was this knowledge though, when he was tied down like Frankenstein in a B-movie?  
  
Somehow the Karakulians must desperately need the regenerative factor in his bloodstream. It escaped him as to why they didn't realize he had it before. Of all the times he'd been captured and plastered to a slab for scientific examination, they'd never suspected his regenerative power, at a cellular level. But it was a factor that depended upon the Time Lord mental control of physical processes. A genetic factor that was impressed into every Time Lord when they underwent the Change at graduation. Well the Doctor could remember that fateful day when he stepped through the Psinapsifier arch, the symbolic right of passage for every Time Lord. When each Junior was hurled into the void of the Vortex. A time when the transformation to complete Time Lord forever altered their cellular structure. Black hair plastered to the sides of his temples. With all his might he struggled once more against the drug in his system. Now he knew it was a device, which was stimulating the fear and doubt centers of his brain, he could fight it. Coupled with a depressant, it pushed back his guards. How much deadlier the Karakulians would be if they were telepathic. Any more power and they could burn out his brain.  
  
***  
  
Arms around Callom's sturdy shoulders, Raina limped to safety. At last her body was beginning to heal the horrid burn. She had feared the damage to the muscle was permanent. Even her newfound genetic manipulation curtesy of the Rani's bioengineering power to cope with new environments was taxed to its limits. Tissues were forming into new myosin filaments to replace the burned muscle. Unlike humans, she recalled Vitreum saying that Mantissans could regenerate whole entire organs, not just tissues. In time the muscle would be totally replaced.  
  
Or so she hoped. It was a miracle the gun had not exterminated her. Or that her leg was not broken. "I just hope Ace ken get the Doctor out o' wherever he's trapped."  
  
"She doesn't know . . . where he is," she gasped.  
  
"She had some nasty ideas. Said they were going to drain his mind."  
  
"If they had a ray that could drive people to kill each other, they could very well convince him to shut his own mind off."  
  
"I dinnae ken. I jest remember that those Karakulians had him in some lab, strapped to a table."  
  
"Do you suppose those Karakulians know about him being a Time Lord?"  
  
"Why do ye ask?"  
  
"I was wondering if this whole thing was an elaborate trap, for the Doctor."  
  
"Ace said that the Karakulians and the Doctor were auld enemies."  
  
"Ace! I almost forgot about her," gasped Raina. "Stop right here."  
  
"What?"  
  
"We've got to go back, Callom."  
  
"Dinna be crazy," he said.  
  
"But I just realized. Ace needs your help."  
  
"I cannae jest leave ye here alone."  
  
"I realize I'm not much good with a lame leg, but I'm not totally defenseless." Throughout this adventure she felt she'd been a bigger liability than an asset. Ever since she woke up laying helplessly on that floor she felt sorry for herself. Now was time to stop being rescued, and start taking back her life. "I'm sick of being a liability. I want to fight back."  
  
Those hazel eyes glanced at her anxiously. Every ounce of him struggled with some decision. His lower lip twitched, and his eyes darted. Soft brown eyes read right into his thoughts, even though she no longer sensed his emotions. "You're worried about her," Raina guessed. "And me. The conflict is tearing you apart."  
  
He flinched. "How can ye tell? Yer nae psychic like me."  
  
"I know you, Callom. I can tell when you're disturbed."  
  
Still looking at his boots, he said, "She does nae have a chance. But neither will ye if I dinnae take ye back to the TARDIS."  
  
"Even if you could get me back to the TARDIS, we can't take off without the Doctor. He's the only one who can truly operate the TARDIS anyway. And besides, he saved my life. I feel I need to do all I can to fight to save his life."  
  
"Aye. But you'd be in danger too."  
  
"Perhaps. But I know I can fight them, Callom. I was thinking about what happened in the cell."  
  
"Ye somehow stopped the Karakulian, I remember."  
  
"Right. I may no longer be a full psychic, but somehow I immobilized the Karakulian, just by thinking about it. I had to get close enough to touch its baseplate, though."  
  
"But if ye cannae run, you could get hit! If ye say, ye need to touch the monster to stop it."  
  
"I don't want to go down without a fight," she snapped. Gripped his shoulder suddenly. "Those Karakulians stole my leg, and I want to pay them back for it!"  
  
"But if you shuild die . . ." he said. "What will I do then?"  
  
"I would rather die, knowing I helped to save you, then live knowing that I could have made a difference," she told him. "To survive is one thing. But to die knowing I made a difference . . ."  
  
"Aye," he said grimly. "We'll go back. Together, or no at all."  
  
"What happened, when you said a ray was fired at you," Raina asked Callom, as they teleported throughout the complex.  
  
"A ray was fired at me, yes. It must've been the Growth Accelerator."  
  
"Do you remember where that lab was?"  
  
"I think . . . I ken remember. Aboot three miles . . . northeast by northwest. On the third level."  
  
"Good. Take me there."  
  
"What?"  
  
"If I can use it to accelerate the healing of the cells in my leg, I may give myself a fighting chance."  
  
"What aboot Ace?"  
  
Callom pictured the lab where the strange ray had been fired. A switch fell closed in his mind. Glands oozed compounds. Brief grayness, then they were elsewhere. Raina pushed the haze out of her mind. "That wasn't bad at all," she said.  
  
"Ye dinnae feel sick, do ye?"  
  
"Not at all. In fact, that was invigorating."  
  
Both ducked behind a lab counter as Raina spotted a Karakulian scientist. Almost noiselessly it glided In its transparent tank into the room. Back and forth it arced, as it scanned for anyone.  
  
"Alien presence detected. Query."  
  
Callom gripped the Karakulian from behind. Raina scrambled out, reaching her fingertips toward the baseplate of the tank.  
  
"Alert! Alert! Alien female pre-sent!"  
  
Hatred flooded in her mind at the sound of the grating voice. She forced anger and pain she far down to her toes. Then she channeled the burst through her nerves. Energy forced through the nerve endings on her fingertips into cold lifeless metal sensors.  
  
"Must . . . stop you!"  
  
"Immobilizing . . . Alert . . . systemsmallllfunctiiiiiiiin" groaned the Karakulian. Like an unwound music box its sound retarded, before the tank toppled over and shattered its contents on the floor.  
  
"Och!" gasped Callom. "Did ye kill it?" Whining squeaks were the only sounds the Karakulian could make. Its tentacles flopped helplessly in the puddle of nutrient fluid spreading into a film on the floor around its shattered casing.  
  
"I don't think so," gasped Raina, hand to her head. "I just stopped it from moving."  
  
"How? I ken that the Karakulians move their vats by psychokinesis. Maybe ye somehow interfered with that transfer of power. I either overloaded its relays, or dampened its mental powers."  
  
"No. I don't know why or how... but I had no such abilities before..."  
  
"Too bad ye have t' touch the blasted things to work."  
  
Slowly they searched the laboratory. Callom shivered as he spotted the Growth Acceleration ray. It was mounted on a tripod at one end of the small metal room. Lining metal walls were rows of shelves. Upon many of these shelves were glass dishes, with flat bottoms. Each dish was as big around as a saucer, but transparent with raised sides. Clumps of flesh floated in each container.  
  
"Tissue samples," explained Raina. Flat sections of skin lined the bottoms of three dishes. Next to the skin cultures were placed four or five vertical stacks of red bottomed containers. Callom thought their pancake coatings looked like round pieces of meat.  
  
"Begorra," he gasped, and pointed to other beakers filled with green liquid. Tubes ran into them from strange electronic computer panels. Bubbles issued from the tube tips immersed in the beakers. Peering through the beaker, the room was distorted into an odd curve. From behind, Callom's eyes looked larger. Horrified, he glanced through many beakers of the disembodied chunks of flesh. "I hate dead things flotin in jars," he gasped, clutching his stomach. Faintly his skin flushed green.  
  
"I remember them taking scraping from my skin. These must be tissue samples subjected to the Growth Accelerator."  
  
"Looks like they've been busy," said Callom, with his hands over his eyes. Even though he'd grown up overnight, the young Scot felt extremely young and frightened. Becoming taller and stronger didn't help him face sudden revulsion.  
  
"Better get going. Try to find Ace. I'll manage here."  
  
Swallowing his nausea, he embraced Raina. For a moment he drank in the reassurance of her calmed mind. She seemed so resolved. Silently Callom wished he had that same composure as the geologist. Inside, he was scared to death. In a burst of light, he winked into another dimension. Hand on her ice axe, Raina limped over to the tripod. "Time to use this device for a constructive purpose," she said.  
  
The round tripod supported a silvery gun. On one flat side was a LCD screen with touch sensitive buttons. Raina accessed the first menu.  
  
Growth rate?  
  
Fifty percent  
  
Angle of fire  
  
30 degrees  
  
Time acceleration constant .75  
  
Sequence initializing. Wait for prompt  
  
She smiled to herself, ironically. Like all Earth inventions the Growth Accelerator was computer-controlled. This work of human hands might return her power to walk. Alternatively, the sudden strain of growth might traumatize the muscle far worse than the Karakulian tazer gun. If this dilemma existed for her, what about Callom? What consequences existed because of his growth spurt? Surely such a rapid growth must have some adverse effect on his body, Raina thought. Fear rose in her, combined with sick realization.  
  
"I've got to get my rear moving," she said aloud. Unscrewing the clamps, she pushed the muzzle of the silver ray toward the floor. Until the muzzle of the ray made a forty-five-degree angle with the tripod shaft. Carefully she crouched on the floor, and lay on her side. Raina turned her charred thigh till it was just under the aperture.  
  
Two minutes to Stimulation . . .  
  
Waiting to find out if a collection of microcircuits and silicon would reverse another effect was unnerving. Could a weapon of war be pushed aside by a human invention designed to help? Not only was her leg charred by an alien technology, but also another alien could only heal the leg device.  
  
Stimulation in process . . . five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . . one . . .  
  
Warmth spread in her skin, like a beam of sunshine. Creeping little shivers tingled in her skin. Where there was once nothing but dull pain, sudden feeling arose. Nevertheless, it would take time. Time was something she didn't have. Ace and Callom needed all that she could give. Taking time to make time sometimes paid off.  
  
**  
  
How frustrating it was to have an idea, and be unable to carry it through. Ace was thinking this at the very moment she found the Doctor's cell. By pure luck it seemed she kept out of the way of the Karakulians. One baseball bat, even charged with Time Lord energy, could not stop twelve Karakulian Collectors?  
  
Doc Martins pounded the steel pavements. Eyes glanced up from a plastic- glazed map to the corridor markings as she ran along. Grated voices sounded only mere meters away. Ace struggled to remember how they could track her. Then she remembered the last time she'd fought other beings like this. They were called Daleks. Somehow they sensed infrared energy. Like the heat left over when a human being ran. It was so frustrating. She couldn't mask the heat seeping through her shoes. "If I could find the environmental controls of this city, I could crank up the thermostat."  
  
"Where the heck am I gonna find time to find that," she cursed. All the time to draw elaborate plans, and no way to carry them out without being killed. Maybe that power room, where they were captured, was the place to look. If only. Desperately she fought with the conflict. Dodged behind a corridor, pressing her back flat against cold metal walls. Silently praying to a deity that she didn't believe in that she wouldn't be captured.  
  
Straining her neck, she could just glimpse around the door frame. A squat shadow glided into view, low along the wall. A whole row of them slid diagonally up the flat wall. Soon the scant light swirled into a strange burst of energy. Instinctively Ace curled her fingers around her baseball bat's handle.  
  
"Alien human female detected! Pursue!"  
  
The light solidified into a six-foot tall human male. Energy swirled around him as he appeared. Right in the path of the Karakulian patrol. With just seconds, Ace sprang to her feet.  
  
"Halt! Alien Male detected!"  
  
"Begorra!" he shouted. "Where'd ye pop up from?"  
  
"Cease and desist!"  
  
Reluctantly he raised his hands. Then looking beyond the Karakulian, he smiled. "Of course," he smiled innocently.  
  
"Exterminate this!" shouted Ace, swinging the bat down. Right behind the first Karakulian, the second fired. Callom grabbed the second Karakulian's gun. Ported. An unearthly howl erupted from the second Karakulian as its gun vanished. .Sparks also flew wherever Ace's bat impacted. She'd finished off the first Karakulian, only to face a third. Out of nowhere, Callom appeared. His claymore blade glanced off the third's casing with a clang.  
  
"You idiot!" shouted Ace, despite herself. "That's no good against them!"  
  
Still completing a second swing, Callom crashed his claymore down on the top of the third Karakulian collector. This time, it cleaved the sensor in two. Now, Ace could swing her bat once more against the blinded Karakulian. Both teenagers stood opposite each other, through the smoking ruins. One teenaged hand grasped a bat, the other person's a sword hilt. Like bizarre mirror images they converged as Ace and Callom met in the middle.  
  
"You saved my life," he gasped, only inches from her. Coughing, he stared at the sparking remains of their work.  
  
"Don't you know how dumb that was?" she snapped. "Appearing right in front of a Karakulian."  
  
"Good to see you too, lass," he huffed. Up and down moved the ruffles on his shirt while he gasped in the smoking air.  
  
"Did you get Raina to safety?"  
  
"Aye. In a manner a speaking."  
  
"What?"  
  
"She wanted me to come back, an help ye save the Doctor. I ken where he's being held."  
  
"We'd better get moving. Those Karakulians are swarming all over this place," she said. Callom nodded, and started out in the direction of the labs. Like before he sensed the strange emotions. And felt confused. She was angry at him, and at the same time concerned. How typical. What Callom couldn't decide was whether it was the anger a sister has for a brother, or the anger a woman has when a man she cares for is in danger. The difference seemed important now. He could have very well insisted she thank him for saving her life. But Ace wasn't one of those damsels in a fairytale. She could take care of herself. And him, apparently.  
  
"Serve me right, if they got me," he said.  
  
"Look, that was pretty stupid, but brave, back there," she said. "Thanks."  
  
"Jest hope I remember not to next time."  
  
"What's the Yank doing?"  
  
"She's gone to the Growth Accelerator. Trying to get it back."  
  
"I thought you took her back to the TARDIS," said Ace, disappointed.  
  
"She wants to pay the Karakulians back, fer hurtin her. An I cannae argue wit that."  
  
Ace drew in a sigh. "That's one brave woman."  
  
"I'm looking at one, mahsel nau. Sure more brave than I feel."  
  
She said nothing, when he said this. Teenage reluctance, Callom read in her thoughts. Would he be so guarded about his feelings when he was her age? He turned his attention to remembering the Doctor's lab. "I ken remember that the Doctor was strapped to some kind of table, before they took me away."  
  
"Did it look like a mind draining device?"  
  
"I would nae ken one if I saw one," he admitted. "But he could nae move, once they pressed a few switches. I dinnae think they drugged him. There were one or two electronic clamps on his legs, but his hands were free."  
  
"Once we get there, I'll creep over, and try and free him. But I'll need you to make the Karakulians think I'm not there."  
  
"It'd be a matter a' blocking their thoughts. Should nae be too hard. But there's one thing, though."  
  
"Being?"  
  
"If there is more than one there. I Cannae affect more'n two minds at a time."  
  
"Sh!" she hissed, grabbing his arm.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Patrol."  
  
Callom reached out with his thoughts. Struggled to reach the minds he sensed. Horrible computer-boosted circuits buzzed in his inner hearing. Desperately he forced an image through his mind's eye, out into theirs. Of a blank wall. No life signs. He motioned Ace to silence. Right before them glided the Karakulians. Eye stalks swiveled up and down on turning domes. "Heat traces lead to wall."  
  
"Impossible! Heat trail stops. Heat sources detected."  
  
"No visual range. Visual perception suggests nothing there."  
  
Callom realized they could see heat. Desperately he struggled to stop the inputs to their brains. Computers enhanced perceptions he didn't count on. But he did not affect the eyes. It was their perception of what they saw.  
  
"Nothing present. Heat traces stop."  
  
"Illogical."  
  
Only inches from Ace's nose swung a Karakulian eye stalk. She could see the iris dilate as the puzzled Karakulian tried to decide if it saw something or not. Callom wrinkled his forehead more. Ace could see the strain as he forced the image into the Karakulian's visual cortexes. Just a blank wall. Infrared sensors detect nothing. A blank wall! A blank wall. Tears dripped from his eyes. Ace reached for his clenched fist. Only inches from taking his hand, she hesitated. It was better not to distract him. Two Karakulians swung around to face each other. Mechanical claws clenched, unclenched. Hover discs glided. Indecision.  
  
"Suggest humans have devised a jamming scanner," said the first.  
  
"Proceed with search patterns," recommended the second. Swinging round in unison, they slid away.  
  
Ace gasped in fresh air. She didn't realize she'd been holding her breath the whole time. Callom put hands to his forehead, and rubbed his temples. "Och, I was beginning t' think they'd niver decide."  
  
"Mega," she said. "If you can do that, we'll have no problem getting the Doctor out."  
  
All the young Scot could do was lean back against the wall. Pressing his eyes shut, he silently cried. Why was it so hard all of a sudden to cope? "Hey, that took a lot out of you, didn't it?"  
  
"Somehow, their minds are harder to affect," he said.  
  
"Must be their computerized brains," she said. "They're blobs with bits in them. Cyborgs. Like Daleks."  
  
Putting her arm around his shoulders, she guided him along the hall. "It's okay, Callom," she whispered. "Save it for the room. I know you can do it."  
  
"Just so hard. What if I fail?"  
  
"You won't. I know it."  
  
This time there was no 'Kid' or 'squirt'. She used his real name. Sincerity cracked her hard casing. For the first time, the scared, sixteen-year-old Dorothy seeped through.  
  
***  
  
Back in the main laboratory, the Doctor fought his own battle. Desperately he struggled against immobilization. If the treatment continued, he couldn't stand it much longer. Through the darkness he heard a faint whisper. "Ace," he croaked.  
  
"I'm here, Professor," she said.  
  
Another illusion. But wait. He could feel someone's breath wafting against his ear and cheek. No Karakulian device could duplicate that. "You're in great danger . . . coming here. The Rani. she set us up. for these monstrosities."  
  
"I'm not leaving without you," she said. "I'll get you out of here."  
  
"They'll find you . . ."  
  
"Well, are you keen on dying?"  
  
"What are they doing to you? You look drugged or something."  
  
"Some kind . . . of an inhibitor. Can't move! They're stimulating . . . my bodily production . . . of comatase . . ."  
  
"What?"  
  
"The enzyme . . . in a Time Lord's body that triggers . . . a comatose state . . . They're using the growth accelerator to stimulate . . . its production . . ."  
  
"But Raina's with the Growth Accelerator," said Ace. "That thing above you doesn't look like any growth accelerator I remember."  
  
"What?"  
  
"I'm trying to rescue you. Now shut up, and tell me how to get you loose. Will disconnecting you hurt you?"  
  
"I... don't know. There could be a massive feedback . . ."  
  
Ace checked the restraint clamps. Sure, they looked simple enough. Yet she didn't have the keys with her at the moment. Were they magnetic, or mechanical locks? Then she remembered the terrible strain Callom was under, trying to block her from the Karakulian's perceptions. Desperately she tried to unfasten the Doctor. Hoped she wouldn't activate an alarm. Fingers probed the cold metal restraints clamped to his ankles. Other touches tried the switches. Eyes kept a sporadic lookout for the Karakulian technician at the console. It kept right on depressing controls. Ace wondered if they had anything to do with the Doctor's imprisoning device. She couldn't help but feel that by pulling him from the table, she'd kill him. If it was a mind probe, the sudden shock to his system could overload his synapses.  
  
"Decrease stimulation to temporal lobe. Fifty percent rise in comatase levels.  
  
Again she was faced with something beyond her comprehension. "Doctor!" she hissed. "Help me. What is this machine?"  
  
"A . . . a mental stimulator. . . it's all I can do . . . to stay awake . . ."  
  
"Negative, comatase levels dropping."  
  
"I need to know. Will I kill you if I just pull the plug?"  
  
"It depends . . ."  
  
"On what?" she demanded. "Stay with me, Professor. I need your thinking. This isn't a growth Accelerator. It looks like a mind probe or something."  
  
"Mind probe? Of . . . course . . . mental stimulation . . . of my brain centers. Stimulating the production . . . of adrenaline . . . that's how the settlers died!"  
  
"Come back! I'm talking about you."  
  
"N...no! The settlers were subjected to . . . a ray that stimulated their emotional centers . . . in their brains. Produced em field . .. That govern fear and anger receptors . . . they. got the technology from the Rani!"  
  
"Doctor subject failing to respond to prompt. Suggest suffering from hallucination."  
  
"How do I turn this bloody thing off?" she gritted.  
  
"See that wire, running to the analyzer?"  
  
"Yes," she said, gripping it in her hand.  
  
"Don't touch it, whatever you do!"  
  
"Tell me something I can do," she snapped.  
  
"Alright. Swivel the main element. There's a control knob .. . on that clamp. Turn it . . . to the lowest setting."  
  
"Then what?"  
  
"Increase in heart rate detected. Raise power setting to compensate."  
  
"Grab the panel, on the side .. . of the table. Rip. . . it off!"  
  
"Okay. There's a mess of wires. And circuit cards."  
  
"Pull out . . . the middle card . . . no wait . . . the one to the left of the middle. . ."  
  
"Make up your mind."  
  
"Left for positive flow, right for negative," he babbled.  
  
"Alpha waves increased. Report, test report query . .."  
  
Sighing, Ace ripped out all the cards. Surely this was the control center. Half the time, the Doctor didn't know what he was talking about. She hoped this was one of those times. "Press the red button . . . and stand back . . ."  
  
Nothing happened. Except a small hum. Terminals went black. That glazed look in the Doctor's eyes cleared up immediately. Unfortunately the lights on the main terminal went dead as well. The Karakulian Technician may not notice the Doctor and Ace, but it did notice the defunct switches. "Alert! Systems malfunction in Psinapse stimulator! Doctor escaping!"  
  
"I do suggest we make all haste, and get out of here," said the Doctor. He sat right up.  
  
"Come, on then!" Ace cried. She grabbed his hand, and yanked him off the table. Pressed the umbrella handle into his grasp. Heard the thump of his feet as he raced after her. Heartbeats later they emerged from the lab. For a moment the Doctor dabbed his forehead with his paisley handkerchief. Leaned on the shaft of his umbrella for support. "Phew, I can't believe I got out of there," he gasped. Nothing answered him, except for the cold metal silence of the corridors. Nothing, but someone sobbing faintly. He pressed his hat on his head firmly. Glanced down to where the wall met the floor. There, huddled a fully grown Highlander, pressed into the satin sleeved arms of his companion. "Shh, it's all right," she soothed, stroking his head and back. "It's all over."  
  
"Am I missing something?" interjected the Doctor.  
  
Tears dripping from his eyes, the stranger looked up. Still his chin was pressed into Ace's shoulder. Perspiration plastered his long, blond hair into wavy strands.  
  
One glance confirmed his identity. Despite the Black Watch plaid twined around his body, those kilt pins were unmistakable. So were the soft, bright eyes. "Callom?" gasped the Doctor, crouching with hands resting on his thighs. "Is that really you, lad?"  
  
Shaking, Callom managed a smile. Strong square cheekbones creased with dimples and freckled flesh. "Aye."  
  
Clasping the lad's hand, the Doctor helped him to stand. Ace braced her shoulder into the Scot's armpit, and lifted. "Easy now, take it easy. I know what's what now," said the Doctor. As he draped the Scot's other arm around his neck, the Doctor's hat almost fell off.  
  
"Come on, let's get to the Power room, quickly."  
  
"I'm sorry, Doctor. I could nae keep it up for much longer. Dinnae ken why not."  
  
"That device was sending out interference waves. That's why. I'm amazed your powers worked at all."  
  
"What?"  
  
"That device was a mental stimulator. The peculiar field it sets up when turned on can affect telepathic signals."  
  
"Raina said she can do the same thing," said Callom, sounding recovered. He managed to stand on his own.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Yes. Said she was able to dampen psychic powers."  
  
"But that's not the same thing as that device," said the Doctor, shaking his head. "It was utilizing covariant electromagnetic fields . . . and the e/m distortion feedback in the Karakulian's perceptions were making it difficult for you to block its perceptions."  
  
"You mean, the Karakulian's perception was enhanced?" asked Ace.  
  
"Karakulians can perceive infrared energy. As you well know. But the strain of the machine's interference was influencing Ace's em pattern, and enhancing it."  
  
"Oh, just explain it later," snapped Ace quickly. "We gotta get out of this place."  
  
"How are we going t' do that," gasped Callom. "Ma power's na strong enau to fool a whole city."  
  
"It will, if we can heat up the city."  
  
"That's just what I was thinking. Jack up the thermostat, to ninety-eight- point-six, so they can't see us."  
  
"But there's one problem. They may still be able to sense my body temperature."  
  
"If it only sees a few less of us, so what?" asked Ace. "They'll be blinded."  
  
"By the way, Ace. I do hope you kept those circuits that you pulled out."  
  
"Sure. Why?"  
  
"I'm going to need them soon."  
  
Ace shook her head. Caught Callom's eye. Simultaneously they understood.  
  
***  
  
Raina stood on both her legs now. Peered through a beaker Callom had only hours before. Immersing one finger, she swirled the green soup. "I wonder how many more of these beakers there are," she asked herself. By now she'd determined what each beaker held. The green sludge was a sort of plankton. It was a basic nourishment for the Karakulians. Indeed she remembered seeing a lake full of such green sludge boiling with tubes. And the tubes leading from these green filled beakers sloshed into the petri dishes. Those pieces of skin and muscle were her own tissues growing at a fast pace. Unfastening the Growth Accelerator, she removed it from the tripod. Unclipped the power source feeding into it. It had its own battery pack, and the LCD screen indicated a charge of two earth hours.  
  
"Good," she nodded.  
  
If those samples of tissue were in here, what other labs held such experiments? Only slightly limping now, she crossed to the door. Slid open the panel, and checked the hall. No Karakulians. The room she was in was on automatic. Her other hand jerked the tubes from the petri-dish incubators. Slowly, twelve hundred replicas of her skin stopped growing. And died. It wasn't a sin to kill simple tissues. Yet it might be a problem later if what she suspected were true. Why the Karakulians wanted a growth accelerator. Or why they went to so much trouble to capture the Doctor. Slowly she reached her mind to the place that she shared with Callom:  
  
*Where are you now?  
  
*We've got the Doctor! came his excited reply.  
  
*I've got the device.  
  
*Stay put! We're in the Power room  
  
*Power room? Why?  
  
*The Doctor's gonna turn up the heat.  
  
***  
  
Hands to the sides of his head, Callom concentrated. "She's at the Growth Accelerator room," he reported, staring half at his friends, half into another dimension. "Says she found a whole bunch o' tissue cultures."  
  
"I'm not at all surprised," said the Doctor, serious faced. "They must have been testing the Accelerator on her bodily tissues."  
  
Then, turning to Callom, he asked, "Ask her to give me a description of the wing she's in."  
  
For a moment, Callom moved his lips silently as he thought the information to her. Seconds later, he opened his eyes. "Raina says she's proceeding to a room we saw on the way. There's a sign, with letters."  
  
"Can you project an image of what she's seeing, into my visual cortex?" asked the Doctor. "I'll let down my barriers so you can get it through."  
  
Before his eyes materialized an image, superimposed on his own sight. "Ah. That's a Karakulian tissue bank room. Raina's found it."  
  
"There's a set of these tubes running here," she said. Raising her hands, she grabbed the metal bolts, and twisted.  
  
"Nobody could open that," said Ace. "She'll need a maser for sure .. ."  
  
"Wait," said the Doctor. "I do believe our friend is quite strong."  
  
Raina wedged her ice axe between the bolt's and the door. Pushing down, she managed to pry the locks loose.  
  
"Why do I think what she did was too easy?" asked Ace.  
  
"The Karakulians don't expect anyone to get into that wing."  
  
"But she's Karakulian fodder for sure," said Callom, temporarily breaking concentration. The picture faded from view. "No wait, she says she sees nothing. But I'm worried."  
  
"Keep a mental link open with her. I'm nearly there."  
  
In the Power room the three companions now stood. Wisely the Doctor had barricaded the molten door from attack. The only way out was if Callom teleported someone out. Ace sat on the floor, next to Callom. She was keeping stock of her remaining cans of Nitro-9. Only two were left. Tucking his plaid under himself, he sat on one computer terminal. Callom closed his eyes, and fixed his concentration. Near the Power vats, the Doctor removed a panel from a large computer bank. On his back, he reached up inside at the machine's innards.  
  
"Seems strange they'd have the city brain in here," muttered Ace.  
  
"Not the city brain, but there are computer access panels. If I can get the right access codes, I may be able to change the climate."  
  
"Even if you could flood the city with heat, what's to ensure that they won't see you, at least."  
  
"Your point being?"  
  
"Your body temperatures' about sixty degrees Fahrenheit, and our body temps are well over ninety. And you say you're setting the temperatures to flood at the human body temp range. What good will it do you if they spot you?"  
  
"But that's precisely what I want . . ." he said.  
  
"What? After all we went through to get you out of there?" asked Ace, outraged. "And you say it was a waste of time."  
  
Scooting out from under the computer bank, the Doctor sat up. "Ace, let's get one thing clear. I totally appreciate your efforts to liberate me. Really."  
  
"Then what are you talking about?"  
  
"I want to have them find me, so you three can get away. I want to get into the place where they have their secret weapon."  
  
"Secret weapon?"  
  
"Och, I knew they had something else brewing," interjected Callom. "There was a reason why they attacked that colonists' ship, wasn't there?"  
  
"Raina said it was a trap to lure you here," said Ace. "And you say the Rani."  
  
"Right. But they were the ones who disabled it in the first place. " said the Doctor. "Under her guidance."  
  
"How could they target a ship in hyper drive?" asked Ace.  
  
"In this time period, the Karakulians have limited space travel. Yet there are Karakulian outposts on some of the major planets. I'm assumign the Rani must have visited this planet and helped them in their nevarious experiments. With her help, they broke into the Earth sub-space shipping records, and learned of the Growth Accelerator. With her help they ended up developing a long range warp disabler. It traces ships passages through Hyper space. And targets their nuclear drive mechanisms."  
  
"Is that what stopped the TARDIS?" asked Ace. "But that's not possible, because we travel in time and space."  
  
"They knew they'd eventually catch me, in a certain region of the Vortex. The Hyper space region that ships use is a section of the Vortex. And the Karakulians know a good deal about time travel. In this century. They knew my TARDIS traveled through Hyper space at least once in my Transference. If they kept their device activated, they'd snare me. And in so doing, exact the revenge that the Rani wished upon me for spoiling her experiments on Tetrabyria."  
  
"And the ship?"  
  
"Was an unexpected piece of bait they kept floating. Once they detected a materialization on board."  
  
"But the ship was so far from Karakul . . ."  
  
"Not really. The navigational instruments were faulty."  
  
"But you acted like Raina was wrong," said Callom.  
  
"Yeah," added Ace. She rested hands on her hips, and stood next to the Scot.  
  
"I, er underestimated her powers of deduction," he sighed. "My plan wasn't exactly foolproof."  
  
"Ye'll niver make that mistake again, I hope," said Callom, sitting down again.  
  
"Did you really know the Karakulians were behind this, from the start. Be honest, Professor."  
  
"Not at first. But once I realized the name, Karakul, the pieces fell into place."  
  
"What ever happened to the colonists on the ship? We only saw the crew . . ."  
  
"I'm still working on that, no doubt the Rani had some experiment in mind for them. working through the Karaulians." said the Doctor. Poking his head into the console, he scooted himself back underneath. Only his plaid pants were visible now. And those brown and white shoes.  
  
Ace sat down at the base of the console, near Callom. She drew both legs together, and crossed them Indian-style. "Well. What's Raina telling you now, kid?"  
  
"She's inside the Room. She says that she sees all kind of weird things. But she knows I have na the stomach to listen to a detailed description."  
  
"Tell her not to bother. I've already seen Aliens," said Ace, looking up at him. His hairy bare knees hung over the console side, and his booted feet dangled just above the floor. For a moment he looked like a small child sitting in a highchair. Then he slid down to the floor. Carefully he pulled the kilt underneath himself as he sat down next to her.  
  
"Want some chocolate?" she asked, reaching into the zipper part of her backpack. "I dunno about you, but I'm starving."  
  
"When was it I last ate something?" he wondered. His mouth watered as he heard the rip of wax paper and the crinkle of aluminum foil. Ace broke the candy bar in half, and handed him a slab of smooth dark chocolate. It smelled like ambrosia. Going down it was the best thing he ever tasted. "Y'know wha miss Ferguson always told me? When I'd pay her a compliment on dinner?"  
  
"What?" she asked, scooting closer. Like two schoolchildren sharing secrets, they leaned their heads closer.  
  
"That Y'know you've waited too long t' eat, when what ye put in yair mouth's the best thing you ever tasted."  
  
"Typical," laughed Ace. "She sounds like my gran."  
  
"She was modest all right."  
  
Immediately the smile disappeared from her face. Callom felt the tenseness in her mind. He quieted down, resting his chin on his hands. "Sorry t' make ye remember something."  
  
"It's nothing, really," she said quickly.  
  
"D'ye suppose I'm gonna stay this way forever?" he asked her, to change the subject.  
  
"You mean all grown up?"  
  
"Aye. It does nae feel right."  
  
"Believe me, your better off. Being a teenager isn't all it's cracked up to be."  
  
"I'm feeling like I'm missing something though. Like I'm cheating if I stay like this."  
  
"You don't know a good thing when you have it. Now you don't have to worry about how you're gonna look when you stop growing."  
  
"But part o' growing up is having fun being a lad," he said. "Now I can't do it anymore. Can't run and play."  
  
"Who says that?" snapped Ace. "That's a load of rubbish. Look at the Doctor. He doesn't act grown up, and he's old enough to know better."  
  
"How old is he, anyway?"  
  
"Last time he told me, nine-hundred and fifty-four."  
  
"Och, he's the biggest little boy I ever met," grinned Callom. He'd finished his half, and was reaching into his shoulder bag for his canteen. "Water t' wash that doon?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Water. That chocolate sticks t' ma mouth."  
  
"Oh. That crazy accent's hard to understand."  
  
"Does nae surprise me at all. Whenever I get excited, I slip back into it. Yuirs is nae always easy t' get either."  
  
Ace pulled at her hair briefly. The braid was staying in place. Callom's own braid, wound with thread at its end, hung down the side of one cheek. It looked natural. Right in place with the rest of his outfit. Weird. How they were both stuck in this futuristic city, probably close to being blasted by Karakulians. And how they were talking as a brother and sister talked to each other.  
  
***  
  
Raina completed her examination of the Embryo room. She wondered, like the Doctor, why no Karakulians were searching for her. She glanced at her watch. The analogue hand stood at the eighteen, and the six. "Mm. Been three earth hours. I'm no closer to what I wanted to know."  
  
Already it felt sweltering. This room was kept a bit warmer. But somehow the thermostat was creeping up. How did heat affect Karakulians. Were they used to a narrow or a wide range of climates? She didn't know. Looking about the room's contents, she was glad Callom wasn't there. Although he had no problems with the sight of blood, he did have problems looking at biological specimens. The misshapen figures suspended in vats were enough to dissuade Hollywood's best horror fans. A stranger to bizarre aliens, Raina shuddered. Such utility existed. As many variations existed as races on Earth. But even the Ice age members of her species were beautiful compared to this.  
  
Sadly she looked at the people. In glass casings. Mutations were already underway. These were once people with hopes, emotions and dreams. In her society, adapting to adverse conditions was a voluntary choice. But these people were conscripted to adapt, into one of the more vicious species in this galaxy. Humans had never fought or heard of Karakulians. Yet from what she'd seen of their primitive, vicious nature, she was certain they were every bit as dangerous as the Doctor claimed. Even worse. It had nothing to do with their appearance. But with their callous disregard for the consequences of their tinkering. Her species tinkered. But not with other species DNA. That was their first solemn law. No mutation without representation.  
  
Yet the Rani had forced something unknown into her system. Polluted her gene-pool. She remembered Vitreum telling her about her people, the Mantissans, who were once stern rivals for the power of Time Travel. Many centuries separated the two cultures, which had achieved a steady policy of mutual non-intervention. Space was divided, as well as time amongst their scientists.  
  
And because she and Callom had touched this alien scientist with their humanity, she had risked her life and died setting them free. She owed Vitreum her life. Grimly she set the Growth Accelerator. Perhaps she could halt the mutation's progression. Reverse the effects, and preselect the replication of human proteins.  
  
"I'm no biochemist, but perhaps I can save them from becoming Karakulians."  
  
How was she going to do that? She knew a thing or two about gene splicing. If the treatments were discontinued, perhaps that would be enough. Then she could accelerate human DNA replication and protein synthesis with the Accelerator . . .  
  
"You will get to your home, I promise," she said solemnly. Again, she looked at the misshapen humans.  
  
***  
  
Ace slipped off her satin jacket. Tied the garment around her waist. Callom's shirt was sticking to his sweaty chest. She could see the droplets glistening against his blond hairs. With the back on one hand and he wiped sweat from his brow.  
  
"Did you have to go and make it as hot as all this?" Ace complained, readjusting her braids. Loose hair poked into her face. She struggled to French-braid Callom's long hair. Patiently he sat still against her tugging and pulling. The end result was amusing. "Och, I look like a real Highlander nau," he laughed.  
  
"A genuine Jacobite," commented the Doctor. He wiped hands on his handkerchief, now a filthy sweat soaked rag. He'd rolled up his shirt sleeves. Long abandoned, his coat, hat and sweater were rolled up into a bundle and stashed near the control panel.  
  
"How long d'ye figure on staying here?" Callom asked. "Surely it must be near hot enau t' escape."  
  
"We must wait for the Karakulians to stop moving."  
  
"How do y' reckon on that?"  
  
"I don't know, Callom. I can give an estimate. . ."  
  
"He really doesn't know, then," sighed Ace, nudging Callom's arm. Despite the sweat pouring down her face, she looked incredible. Those full red lips and sparking dark eyes appeared so vital. With his eyes he discreetly traced the curves of her cheekbones and oval face. Every minute she struggled against her own awkward feelings. He couldn't sense the exact thoughts, but he could feel the conflicting mental images. She still tried to interact with him as a child, and a peer. But something was making it intensely difficult. Those pictures of him were broadcasted strongly into his inner psyche. Images of him and her in strange locations. Pure fantasy.  
  
Males were the ones who had such fantasies. But the books failed to make note that women also had fantasies about the opposite sex. Whoever wrote the biology texts about human sexuality was biased. "Och, this is daft! I gotta get a grip on mahsel."  
  
Conveniently, he was concentrating on Raina. For any trace of psychic communication she'd broadcast. Pushing his feelings aside, he reached for her mind: *We're hot enau here, Raina  
  
*Right. I found your colonists. Karakulian fodder  
  
*(telepathic shudder) As I thought. But are ye okay? Seen any Karakulians?  
  
*One or two have glided in here. But I'm hiding behind one of the incubators. I don't think they can see me. Even when they do, they don't know what hit them.  
  
Back in the Embryo room, Raina crouched behind the incubation unit. Sweat dripped down her forehead. Her own body temperature struggled against the increased heat. On her lap she held the Growth Accelerator. It had done its work well. Already, some of the mutations had halted considerably. Considerably enough for the Karakulian technicians to notice. It was only feet away from her grasp.  
  
Slowly she reached her hand out to its baseplate. Focused her mind as before. Pressed her hand to one globe sensor. They were pressure sensors. Quite by accident she'd discovered this was the right place on their casing. Anywhere else was incorrect, for the Karakuliananium casing was impenetrable. What could eat through the casing? She managed to examine the metal. Nitro-9 managed to blow them apart. But it was in short supply. If more Karakulians came into the room, they'd surely overpower Raina by sure weight of numbers. And she wasn't about to climb into a casing and escape that way. Just the thought of scrunching into that tiny seat was unbearable. To sit where they sat, those monsters that stole her leg. Unbearable. Just as unthinkable as sliding into a cavern.  
  
***  
  
Ace stood up, and dabbed more sweat from her forehead. Within the small room the air grew thick and moist. It seemed to hang just upon their skins. "Ugh," muttered the Doctor. "I suppose I did overdo it a might."  
  
"Ye can say that again," muttered Callom. Swinging his shoulder bag onto his shoulder, he stumbled to his feet.  
  
"Are you okay?" asked Ace.  
  
"I'm fine. It's jest this heat. I'm no used to it."  
  
"I should have guessed," said Ace. "You're probably better off in freezing cold."  
  
"Scotland summers dinnae get this hot. Or moist."  
  
"Time we were going, children," said the Doctor. Both Ace and Callom saw him operate the door control. They held their breath as the panel slid open. First came the Doctor, stepping lightly on his feet. Back and forth he glanced, trying to spot any Karakulian patrols. So far, none appeared. He waved to Ace and Callom, that it was safe to proceed.  
  
"How much longer are we going t' snoop around like this?" Callom asked.  
  
"Till we rejoin Raina. I had a feeling she'd try to help those colonists."  
  
"Did the Karakulians really mutate them?" asked Ace.  
  
"Raina was there. And she saw the evidence."  
  
"Disgusting," muttered Callom, visibly repulsed at the thought of people transforming into the living bubbling lumps of hate.  
  
"Doctor, there's a wee thing tha's been bothering me," said Callom, slipping ahead of Ace.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Raina said that ye piloted the TARDIS to this planet, after the explosion. But ye say the TARDIS is trapped here."  
  
"What's your question."  
  
"How did ye get the TARDIS to work, t' get here?"  
  
"It works for short hops, through space. What's damaged is the fourth dimensional control. The Karakulian weapon shorted out the temporal relays. Only the Dematerialization spatial controls are intact."  
  
"Mind saying that in English?"  
  
"I mean, the TARDIS can dematerialize into the Hyper space part of the vortex. That's the same dimension through which you pass when you teleport, Callom. But the ability to move freely in time is gone."  
  
"If that's so, why was the ship disabled. It doesn't travel through time. And it was disabled."  
  
"The ship wasn't disabled. Merely controlled by the Karakulians. The TARDIS, however, was disabled. Because of the mercury fluid links in the TARDIS. Luckily, the Dematerialization mains are an independent crystallocybernetic unit."  
  
"He means the Karakulian's invention was too much for that Gallifreyan circuitry," said Ace.  
  
"Whatever. But can ye fix it?"  
  
"I did. But I've got to put that hyper drive remote control unit out of action, so we can escape."  
  
"What do you want with those bits from that mind control machine?"  
  
"Ace, it's not a mind control machine. It's a cerebral stimulator. And secondly, you'll find that part out later."  
  
"When you figure out what you're actually gonna do with it, right?" said Ace. Pressing lips together, the Doctor said nothing.  
  
Callom looked at Ace, and couldn't help but snicker. It was funny to see them arguing, despite all that was happening around them. By now she'd determined what each beaker held. The green sludge was a sort of plankton. It was a basic nourishment for the Karakulians. Indeed she remembered seeing a lake full of such green sludge boiling with tubes. and the tubes leading from these green filled beakers sloshed into the petri dishes. Those pieces of skin and muscle were her own tissues growing at a fast pace. Unfastening the Growth Accelerator, she removed it from the tripod. Unclipped the power source feeding into it. It had its own battery pack, and the LCD screen indicated a charge of two earth hours.  
  
"Good," she nodded.  
  
If those sample of tissue were in here, what other labs held such experiment? Only slightly limping now, she crossed to the door. Slid open the panel, and checked the hall. No Karakulians. The room she was in was on automatic. Her other hand jerked the tubes from the petri--dish incubators. Slowly, twelve hundred replicas of her skin stopped growing. And died. It wasn't a sin to kill simple tissues. yet it might be a problem later if what she suspected were true. Why the Karakulians wanted a growth accelerator. Or why they went to so much trouble to capture the Doctor. Slowly she racked her mind to the placed that she shared with Callom.  
  
*Where are you now?  
  
*We've got the Doctor! came his excited reply.  
  
*I've got the device.  
  
*Stay put! We're in the Power room.  
  
*Why?  
  
*The Doctor's gonna turn up the heat!  
  
Hands to the sides of his head, Callom concentrated. "She's at the growth accelerator lab," he reported, staring half at his friends, half into another dimension. "Says she found a whole bunch of tissue cultures."  
  
"I'm not at all surprised," said the Doctor, serious faced. "These must have been testing the accelerator on her body tissues. And the Rani must be somehow involved in this."  
  
Then turning to Callom, he asked, "Ask her to give me a description of the wing she's in."  
  
For a moment, Callom moved his lips silently as he thought the information to her. Seconds later, he opened his eyes. "Raina says she's proceeding to a room we saw on the way. There's a sign, with letters."  
  
"Can you project an image of what she's seeing into my visual cortex?" asked the Doctor. "I'll let down my barriers so you can get it through."  
  
Before his eyes materialized an image, superimposed on his own sight. "Ah, that's a Karakulian Embryo room. Raina's found it."  
  
"There's a set of these tubes running here," she said. Raising her hands, she grabbed the metal bolts and twisted.  
  
"Nobody could open that," said Ace. "She'll need a torch for sure..."  
  
"Wait," said the Doctor. "I do believe our friend is quite strong."  
  
Raina wedged her ice ax between the bolts and the door. Pushing down, she managed to pry the locks loose.  
  
"Why do I think what she did was too easy?" asked Ace.  
  
"The Karakulians don't' expect anyone to get into that wing."  
  
"But she's Karakulian fodder for sure," said Callom, temporarily breaking concentration. The picture faded from the Doctor' view. "No wait, she says she sees nothing. But I'm worried."  
  
"Keep a mental link with her open. I'm nearly down."  
  
On the power room the three companions now sat. Wisely the Doctor had barricaded the door next to Callom. Ace was keeping stock of her remaining cans of Nitro-9. Only two were left.  
  
Tucking his plaid under his thighs, he sat near one terminal. "Seems strange they'd have the city brain in here," Ace muttered. She started to French braid Callom's long hair. Patiently he sat still against her tugging and pulling.  
  
Near the power turbines, the Doctor removed a panel from a large computer bank. On his back, he reached up inside at the machine's insides. "No, Callom, this isn't the city brain. But these are access panels to the environmental controls of the city. If I can remember the right access codes, I may be able to change the weather."  
  
"Ye done wi' the pulling yet, lass?" Callom asked.  
  
"Oh, yeah. Now you've got Johnny Tremain's hairstyle."  
  
Callom stood, and walked over to one of the monitors. In its surface he could glimpse his reflection. The end result of Ace's styling was funny.  
  
"Och, I look like a genuine highlander now," he laughed.  
  
"A real Jacobite," commented the Doctor. He wiped his hands on her handkerchief, now just a filthy sweat soaked rag. Callom was impressed. Ace had actually read that book by Esther Forbes. The same lass didn't bother reading old stuff, off a scholastic list. As for himself, Callom devoured every classic he could get his hands on.  
  
"If you flood the city with heat, what's to ensure that they won't see you, at least?"  
  
"Your point?"  
  
"Your body temperatures about thirty degrees lower than ours. You say you're setting temperatures to flood at the human body range. What good will it do for you?"  
  
"But that's precisely what I want."  
  
"What? After what we went through to get you back?" demanded Ace, outraged. "And you say it was a waste of time."  
  
Scooting out from under the computer bank, the Doctor sat. "Ace, let's get one thing straight. I totally appreciate you efforts to liberate me. really."  
  
"Then what are you going on about?"  
  
"I want to have them find me, so you three can escape. I want to get into the place where they have their secret weapon."  
  
Ace slipped of her satin jacket. She tied the garment around her waist. Callom's shirt was sticking to his sweaty chest. she could see the droplets glistening on his blonde hairs. With the back of one hand he wiped the sweat from his forehead.  
  
"Did you have to go and make it as hot as all this?" Ace complained, readjusting her braid. Loose hair feel into her face.  
  
He'd rolled up his shirt sleeves. Long abandoned, his coat and sweater were rolled up into a bundle and stashed near the control panel.  
  
"How long d' ye figure on staying here?" Callom asked. "Surely it must be near hot enau t' escape."  
  
"We must wait for the Karakulians to stop moving."  
  
"How do y' reckon on that?"  
  
"I don't know, Callom. I can give an estimate..."  
  
"He really doesn't know, then," sighed Ace, nudging Callom's arm. Despite the sweat pouring down her face, she looked incredible. Those full lips and sparkling dark eyes appeared so vital. With his eyes he discreetly traced the curve of her cheekbones and face. Every minute she struggled against her own awkward feeling. He couldn't sense the exact thoughts, but he could feel the conflicting mental images. She still tried to interact with him as a child, and peer. But something was making it intensely difficult. Those picture of him were broadcasted strongly to his inner psyche. Images of him and her in strange locations.  
  
Males were the ones who had such fantasies. But the books failed to notice that women also had fantasies about the opposite sex. Whoever wrote the biology text about human sexuality was biased.  
  
"Oh, this is daft," he snorted to himself. "I gotta get a grip on mahsel"  
  
He focused on Raina. For any trace of communication she'd broadcast lately. Pushing his hormonal feelings aside, he reached out again:  
  
*We're hot enau, Raina  
  
*Right. I found the colonists. They are... Karakulian Fodder.  
  
*Ugh. As I thought. But are ye okay? Seen any other Karakulians?  
  
*One or two have glided in here. I'm hiding behind the incubators. I don't think they can sense me. Even when they do, they won't know what hit them.  
  
***  
  
Back in the Embryonic lab, the geologist crouched behind the unit. Sweat dropped down her forehead. Her own body temperature struggled against the increased heat. On her lab she held the Growth Accelerator. It had done its work well. Already, some mutations reversed.  
  
Considerably enough for the Karakulian technicians to notice. It was only a few feet away from her grasp. Slowly she reached her hand out to its base plate. Focused her mind as before, in the cell. She pressed her hand to one of the sensors, for pressure detection, she guessed. By accident she'd discovered that this was the proper weak place on the casing to focus this new destructive force of her mind.  
  
What could eat through the casing? She managed to examine the metal. Nitro- 9 managed to damage them enough to stop them temporarily. Unfortunately, it was in short supply here. If more Karakulians cam into the room, they'd surely overpower Raina. She could only immobilize one at a time.  
  
She wasn't about to try concealing herself inside a casing.  
  
Ace had stood again. Within the room the air grew thick and moist. Humidity hung on their skins. The Doctor muttered, "Ugh. I suppose I did overdo it a might."  
  
"Ye can say that again," muttered Callom. Swinging his bag onto his shoulder, he tottered to his feet.  
  
"Are you okay, Cal?" Ace asked.  
  
"Fine. Jest the heat. I'm nae used t' it."  
  
"I should have guessed. You're probably better off in freezing cold."  
  
"Scotland summers dinnae reach this temperature. Or this humidity..."  
  
"Time we were going, children," said the Doctor. He tied his extra clothes into a bundle with his necktie. Both Ace and Callom saw him open the door, and held their breaths as it slid open. Hanging his bundle over the end of his umbrella, he casually stepped into the corridor. Back and forth he glanced, trying to spot any Karakulian patrols. "Ally, ale, oxen free," he announced, waving to them to join him.  
  
"How much longer are we going te snoop around like this?" Callom asked.  
  
"Till we rejoin our geologist friend. I had a feeling she'd try to help the colonists."  
  
"What's wrong wi that?"  
  
"did the Karakulians really mutate them?" Ace cut in.  
  
"Raina was there. And she relayed the evidence to our Scottish guard."  
  
"Disgusting it was," Callom grunted, visibly repulsed at the images of people transforming into wizened wads of hate.  
  
"Doctor, there's a wee thing tha's bothering me still."  
  
"What, lad?"  
  
"Raina said ye piloted the ship to the surface, after our TARDIS crashed. I remember Ace'n me being inside w' Raina..."  
  
"What's the question?"  
  
"How did the Karakulians get the TARDIS into the city?"  
  
"Easy. The Karakulians transported it here."  
  
"But why didn't we just go back, with the colonists, to escape. How badly is it damaged?"  
  
"The fourth dimensional stabilizer. The Karakulian weapon shorted it out. Only the dematerialization is working, for short hops through space."  
  
"Meaning, in English..."  
  
"The TARDIS can still pass through hyper space in the Vortex. That's the same dimension you pass through when you port, Callom. But the ability to move freely in the fourth dimension... time... is gone."  
  
"If that's so, then why was the ship gonzoed?" asked Ace. "It doesn't travel through time."  
  
"The ship wasn't disabled after all. Merely controlled by the Karakulians. The TARDIS was disabled. The fluid links were vaporized. However, the demat's a crystallocybernetic unit."  
  
"He means the Karakulian's inventions fried the timing?" Callom said.  
  
"Yeah, whatever. But can you get it working again, Professor?"  
  
"Of course I can," the Doctor snorted. "But I've got to put that Karakulian remote controller of hyper drives out of action, so we can escape."  
  
"What did you do with those circuits from the mind controller?"  
  
"Ace, I told you it's not a mind control machine. It's a cerebral stimulator. And secondly, you'll find that part out later..."  
  
"When you actually figure out what the hell you're going to do with it, right?" said Ace.  
  
Clenching his jaw, the Doctor trudged on ahead. He said nothing. Callom looked at Ace, and stifled a laugh. It was funny to see them arguing, despite all the dangers that could happen in any second.  
  
*** "I never volunteered for morgue duty," Callom complained. Sweat still plagued him. Mute footsteps passed in front of him. In his hands the Doctor clutched a small box. he walked backwards in front of them, like some bizarre pied piper.  
  
"This way folks," he said. "Flight for Cerise leaving in five minutes."  
  
"Look out, Doctor!" Callom cautioned.  
  
So intent was the doctor on walking backwards, that he tripped over a nearby section of floor. Control box and Doctor crashed backwards. Time lord hit floor as the box flew through the air out of his hands. Right into Callom's. The Scot dived right under the unit.  
  
"Ye gotta be mair careful, man!" he snapped.  
  
"Right, right," grumbled the Doctor, rubbing his backside. Callom reached out a large hand, which the Time Lord reluctantly grasped. He pulled up, and dusted himself off.  
  
"Thank you. Good teleporting, m'lad."  
  
Thirty figures tramped past them. "Wait!" the Doctor shouted, grabbing the remote.  
  
Callom shook his head. Then he winced at the blackness curling in front of his eyes. For a moment he rubbed them. Had to focus. Fight the urge to pass out. Regaining control, he dashed after the strange parade. Through steel corridors the melancholy toy soldiers passed. Until they stopped in front of a strangely coded door. Out the door they continued, onto the battered pockmarked surface of Karakul itself. Callom drew in a breath. He'd not seen it before, on the outside. So blissful did the open spaces to him seem , that he forgot the blackness in his head. Overhead, the gray clouds whirled, mirroring the gray metal underfoot. Huge spires interconnected with long tunnels rimmed the horizon. Immediately ahead of the party, Callom spotted three or four round disk buildings suspended on high poles, like towers.  
  
"Where'd the Jetson's come in," he wondered.  
  
Then he realized they were Karakulian craft, in their support columns. Identical in size and configuration to the one that latched onto the Cerise so long ago. Dragging his feet, he caught up to the Doctor. Metal landscapes stretched as far as his eyes could perceive. Expect for the distant high mountains that peeking behind the saucers, Callom could see no other planetary features. Not even the forest was visible, except on the distant mountains.  
  
Up an inclined plane they stumbled. Just before the hatch, Callom stopped. Still the Doctor treaded backwards with his control box in front of the lines of colonists. Callom and the time lord bracketed the door while the strange cargo filed inside.  
  
"Now leaving on runway ten," Callom joked somberly. "Dinnae ferget t' check yair baggage through to the colony."  
  
"That's the last one," the Doctor smiled. "Come on, we've gotta set this for take off."  
  
Inside, Raina and Ace puzzled over the alien controls. Raina leaned against one panel, and muttered, "Seems simple enough."  
  
"If you can know Karakulian scribble, that is," Ace said.  
  
"All these saucer craft are the same. Liquid ion propulsion creates an air cushion to take off. Then antigravity kicks in. This knob controls the horizontal movement.... and this one here controls the vertical..."  
  
"Great, if you're going to the outer limits, Yank."  
  
Raina winced. Unlike the spherical Aries command deck module, the Karakulian saucer had myriad systems that seemed incompatible with the Earth technology. But the Doctor had somehow miraculously spliced them together. He'd taken the wires from the Cerise's hyper drive control and grafted them into the Karakulian circuits. All Ace and Raina had to do was weld the framework of the remaining orbital craft to the saucer once they were in orbit. Then, thirty slumbering mutants could be pushed through the docking ring in silence.  
  
"Are we ready to go?"  
  
"It's a miracle you rewired these systems so we can just past this thing to the ship."  
  
"That's the easy part."  
  
"Then how come you're not flying this thing?" Ace demanded.  
  
"Callom and I have to keep an eye on the Karakulians. In case they wake up."  
  
"I still don't like leaving Callom here," said Raina.  
  
"Someone needs to baby-sit him," Callom laughed softly, indicating the Doctor. He stuck is head and shoulders part-way into the room. Dark circles appeared under his young eyes. Were those gray streaks creeping into his hair?  
  
"Dinnae worry," he said, as he guessed what she thought. "I'm okay. It's jest the heat in the city."  
  
"And what about the Karakulians?" said Raina. "How much longer can that heat hold them, Doctor."  
  
"That's the difficult part I mentioned."  
  
*** 


	5. A Growing Madness Part 4

Disclaimer: The characters of Dr. Who and Ace are property of BBC. The character of Raina MacLaren and Callom Stewart are property of me, Tryniamerin. My characters mean now harm to the show. This is written out of enjoyment for a creative show... and to preserve a good sf time travel saga!  
  
A Growing Madness  
  
Part 4:To outer limits and beyond:  
  
Theresa E. Meyers  
  
Written 1996, revised 1998  
  
Raina and Ace drifted through the black, diamond-studded void. Huge struts surrounded them as they started patching pieces together. Ace clipped herself to one strut with a safety harness.  
  
"I never thought you'd know about orbital repair stuff," she said.  
  
"I'm a big SF nut," Raina said.  
  
"Hope the Professor put the TARDIS back together," Ace muttered, barely discernible over Raina's radio channel.  
  
"Do you think those Karakulians saw us moving the colonists?"  
  
"Not likely. The Professor said the heat'd slow them down."  
  
"I'm just worried about these colonists. Getting thirty people in a trance to move them onto a ship was easy enough. But keeping them alive once they're here..."  
  
"Just one other thing..."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"How did we get them out, unnoticed? Karakulians notice when heir experiments are done."  
  
"I left tissue in the incubation units," Raina explained. "The detectors just register growth, not what was growing inside."  
  
"So what is inside?"  
  
"Tumors. Large ones."  
  
By now the saucer was welded into the struts. What had baffled them was the silence on Karakul. They'd taken off without a hitch. After their ordeal it seemed strange that everything worked out so smoothly. Raina felt uneasy in the back of her mind. Wield a space-ready blowtorch didn't help. The plasma stream melded the Karakuliananium to barite polymer. Harsh, unfiltered sunlight gleamed off the huge hundred foot girders. Just deciding where to attach them was difficult.  
  
"All done on my side, Yank," announced Ace, over the voice channel.  
  
"Okay. It's good enough for government work over here. Let's take five."  
  
Hand placed after hand, Raina pulled herself. She reached the airlock on the side of the living quarters of the Cerise. Both women waited for five minutes as air flushed into the small spherical room. Painstakingly they undid the safety latches on their suits and stepped out. Then they slipped in through the inner hatch. As they peeled off the coolant suits, bare skin became visible against undergarments. Ace shuddered when she saw the shiny burn scar tissue up Raina's right leg. What had once been charred flesh and seared muscle had healed over with scar tissue. Shiny tissue mottled with red seemed to melt and flow over normal skin. it reminded Ace of the pictures she'd seen of Hiroshima survivors. She pulled on her tights and miniskirt. Still in her black lace brazier, she began to hunt for a T- shirt.  
  
"Feels good to be out of those suits," she muttered. The teenager tried not to let Raina see the pity in her face. If Raina noticed at all, she didn't acknowledge it. Over her tanned skin she pulled the long undergarments Ace'd seen her put on in the TARDIS wardrobe room. Right over what would seem to be normal underclothing. Raina slipped on a T-shirt saying Destroyer Tour 76, I WAS there..  
  
"Do you know what gets me?" Ace asked. Now fully clothed, she braided her hair.  
  
"That being?"  
  
"Will the force of the hyper jump rip the saucer off? Even though we welded it on good?"  
  
"I hope not. But the auxiliary unit should kick in if the saucer drive is lost. That's the fail-safe built into every module of the Aries class of ship."  
  
Raina entered the lounge. Exhausted, Ace followed. Raina noticed Ace slipping petroplastic disposable flight coveralls over her clothing. It was funny to see her wearing the mute powder blue of a long dead colonist.  
  
"How are you holding up, Yank?" she asked Raina. In zero g the Geologist folded head in hands and drifted near the food hydrator.  
  
"Oh, okay, I guess. Just feeling the rigors of being thirty five," she sighed.  
  
"I'll get us something t' drink. Spacework's thirsty slogging."  
  
Raina closed her eyes, and tracked backwards into her mind. She could recall what Callom had last transmitted there. About what happened to him and the others while she was in the embryo room:  
  
***  
  
Fixing ships was the easy part. Raina was no engineer, but her experience from her travels gave her enough knowledge for the basic space repairs. Everything went so smoothly it was difficult to believe she'd been cringing in some Karakulian lab mere hours before. "Here you are, Yank," said Ace. She handed Raina a squeeze bottle filled with water.  
  
"Oh, thanks."  
  
"Why are you staring off into space?"  
  
"Just thinking. I don't like the way Callom looks. He appeared exhausted."  
  
"Little wonder. No everyone grows up overnight."  
  
"The effect of the sudden growth on his system. that's what worries me. It could be more dangerous."  
  
"The Doctor will find out an answer."  
  
"What if he doesn't? He's no biogeniticist."  
  
"What could go wrong? He just went through the teenage years, and is all grown up."  
  
"I fear it may be a hyper aging problem."  
  
Ace bit her lip. she was hiding something. Reading body language got her far enough to guess if someone might be lying. But she couldn't be completely sure. Even if she was a telepath like other members of her species, it was offensive to look into mind without the person knowing. At least in human society. Especially with people you were supposed to trust. Raina shoved her suspicions back. She couldn't afford to mistrust Ace. After all, they were still in deadly danger when the Karakulians woke.  
  
"Just as well I can't read minds," Raina decided. Both women ate hydrated food in silence. There was little they could do except wait.  
  
"The Doctor didn't load his TARDIS on board, right?"  
  
"I don't remember," said Ace. "If he didn't, he'd be pretty dumb."  
  
"Seems he doesn't always act on common sense. At least not human common sense. But if he gets the TARDIS working, that's probably how he'll get up here with us."  
  
"Still, he'd be a right mess without me to look after him," said Ace.  
  
"I've noticed that. he'd still probably be stuck in that lab if you hadn't been there to bail him out."  
  
"It was Callom that did it," she said. "That power he has is totally wicked. Something else! Teleportation..."  
  
"I know. The people... in my time have such ability but it is rare. Only 10 percent of humans are born with psychic powers. Most of us are as you see me. Which is amazing considering Callom is from twentieth century earth, when such abilities were still questioned..."  
  
"Where you from, Yank? What time?"  
  
"The twentieth century, on Earth in California, 1979."  
  
"But if you were born on Earth, why are you so strong?" Ace asked.  
  
"I think the Rani must have done some of her genetic engineering on me."  
  
"But Vitruem... you said that you didn't trust her. And yet you told me now that you'd do anything to make it right..."  
  
"You bet. She redeemed herself in my eyes. And for all the horrible things the Rani made her do... the damn Time lords..."  
  
"Take it they're not too popular with you," Ace said.  
  
"No. After what she told me about what they did to her people.... Centuries ago. In fact, the Doctor is the first time lords I actually almost trust. Considering the Rani was the first Time Lord I met, you can understand..."  
  
"What planet did Vitreum come from?"  
  
"Mantissa. It's in the Kasterborous group. Her race developed independently, on the fourth planet of A binary system. Except when the Time Lords came."  
  
"Nothing ever changes, back in Perivale," said Ace. Raina didn't bother to ask. She could guess the rest of the story. "You and the kid seem pretty tight."  
  
"He and I were fellow specimens in the lab of the Rani," said Ray.  
  
"He's pretty lucky, that you're looking out for him."  
  
"Sometimes I don't know. Wandering through space and time. Is that any kind of place for a child to grow up?"  
  
Ace glared at her.  
  
"I wasn't talking about you. You're already there," Raina said quickly. Ace relaxed. She bit into another piece of sandwich. Raina chewed away at her vegetable salad concentrate. Casually she drifted near the viewport, anchored by her swami-belt.  
  
"That hole was pretty tough to patch up," she said. "Stupid Karakulian ship. Do they blow up everything they encounter?"  
  
"Those bildgebags screw up everything, pretty much. Like the Daleks..."  
  
"When did you and the Doctor run into them?"  
  
"Was back in 1963. London. Coal hill. They blew up my boom-box."  
  
"If I never see another Karakulian, it will be too soon," said Ray with a shudder.  
  
"Ray, what's wrong?"  
  
"Just a feeling. Like there was some sort of a disturbance."  
  
"News flash from Cal?"  
  
"Nothing telepathic. More like a general feeling that things are not right."  
  
"You mean it feels like we got away too easily?"  
  
"No. It's like I was in the Embryo room. Everything seemed all right when I had just reversed the mutation. Then I heard a noise...  
  
***  
  
I'd grabbed a steel bar, and I held it out in front of myself for self- defense. That Karakulian that stood right in front of me was waving its gun. How ironic. My own actions gave me away again.  
  
Then it said in that horrible computerized voice, "You will move away from the tissue production apparatus..."  
  
I spat, "Will I?"  
  
I wasn't about to let some stupid cyborg machine stop me. Not like last time. Then the thing went to say, "If you do not follow my command, you will be killed."  
  
"Why don't you just get it over with and save yourself the trouble," I sneered. I grabbed more tightly to that bar, I tell you.  
  
"You will not ask questions... you will obey..." it said, like some skipping CD.  
  
Ever so slowly I edged along that back wall. I hoped to get closer to the door. I'd slung the Accelerator onto my back. The dumb machine didn't notice it on me.  
  
"Move away from the cultures! Move! Move!"  
  
"Whatever you say," I grinned. Then, still holding that bar, I moved away from the wall. slowly. That Karakulian mirrored my every move. when I moved right, it covered me. I felt like we were parentheses, because the space between us didn't change. That same ten feet apart was constant. I took my chance. I tossed that bar, and hit the deck. Overtop I felt the heat of that blast sizzle. Seconds felt like eternity, and I just barely managed to roll to one side, out of the way. But just close enough to touch it. My hearts beat faster than ever. I could feel the adrenaline surging. So I reached down inside, deep down and channeled my fear and anger. Right out of my fingertips. White fire seemed to ignite my brain.  
  
Then I heard the voice slowing down. As if someone forgot to wind it up. I shook all over. I had just enough strength to limp to my feet. This leg was now able to support most of my weight again. It was wonderful to be able to use it again, even though I did limp down that hallway. But I hadn't gotten halfway down it before I dropped to the floor again. I could hear the vibrations through the floor, because I had my ear pressed down against it. Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw sudden movement.  
  
"We wondered why you were laying on the floor when we saw you."  
  
I was relieved when it was you guys.  
  
"Yeah. Sure felt like some naff love in."  
  
"Can you blame me? I was relieved."  
  
But I didn't like the look of Callom. He just seemed so, well, exhausted. He was leaning on me pretty hard. That's another reason why I think it is a side effect of the sudden growth.  
  
Yeah. I noticed. . But I was wondering what they were doing with those colonists anyway..."  
  
"I think they were taking the Doctor's regeneration properties and infusing them into the experimental Karakulians. I set the mutation generators in a reverse sequence."  
  
"How did you put the DNA back the way it was?"  
  
"Not all the cells were completely mutated yet. I simply used the Growth Accelerator with target DNA replication in the unaffected cells after I stopped the mutation process."  
  
"Cool. But it took hours to get everyone on board. Especially since they must have mutated into something that could walk again. They were almost blobs by the time we found you..."  
  
"That reminds me. I'd better check the intravenous supplies for them..." Raina said. Ace noticed she'd not touched another bite of salad, and was already gathering up her tray. She unclipped herself from the table. With one well-judged push she sailed gracefully across the room. Both women cleared up all drifting particles. All plates and trays disappeared into the sonic agitator. Buzzing sound waves would shake loose any leftovers so the plates could be reused.  
  
Both women clipped themselves to the rope running through the lower hatch. First Ace, then Raina somersaulted through. Down became up, and up became down. That's how it was in space. Four times the useful surface area. Since the gravity system was shut down to save energy as the fuel core recharged.  
  
Along their lifelines they threaded themselves. Till they reached the sleeping quarters. Thirty people slumbered. Strapped into place with restraint harnesses, they floated spectrally above the beds. Raina felt their breaths with the back of one hand. "Still alive, thank goodness."  
  
"What was with you, up there in the lounge?"  
  
"?"  
  
"I mean, like the blood's gone back into your face. Your string was really wound..."  
  
"I felt that same feeling up there. Only it was starting to overwhelm me. I just had to get out of there."  
  
"It's the ship. The Professor said you had weird outs before...."  
  
"That lounge... I could still hear the laughter of the people there. They liked to play cards. Just think. Out in space they played an old fashioned game. Without electronics."  
  
"It's creeps enough in here..."  
  
"But these people are alive, Ace."  
  
"All the same, can we check the controls?"  
  
"Okay..."  
  
Through the storage bay they threaded themselves to the gerbil tube. Then, to the Karakulian saucer they drifted. Only ticking lights greeted them. Circular control knobs that cold only be manipulated by friction claw dominated he panels a totally alien technology had been spliced to the Aries class ship. Ironic how the Karakulian technology would save thirty people once destined to become Karakulians. Here, in the saucer, artificial gravity was in full effect. Raina stood before a forward panel on the second level. Ace stood near the viewport.  
  
"Let's test maneuvering," suggested Raina. For a moment she hesitated placing her hands where the enemy's once controlled. Ace saw the revulsion in her face. She shuddered. Guilt rose in her at the image of Raina crumpling under a Karakulian gun. Sticky notes labeled each control. Courtesy of Ace. She had all sorts of things in her backpack. It made sense to label each Karakulian ciphered panel with the corresponding English word. The were taking a rash course in Karakulianese flying. Callom had complained long ago about not being able to read the Hispaniarse Martian colonist writing on the Cerise's supplies.  
  
Callom. Raina eased circular disks in various positions. Slowly the ship mimicked her movements. As she stood with her back to Ace, Raina's long French braid moved up and down in concert with her glancing at the various panels. UP and around the vest's back moved the tip of the braid. It seemed like Raina could fly any ship she laid hands upon. Unlike the Doctor. If he had control, ace would be picking herself up off the walls by now. Or else digging for a space sick bag as she tried not to hurl.  
  
How did Raina have so much control over her life when it was just as chaotic as Ace's and the Doctor's? Even with a lame leg she'd coped. more amazing she had survived Karakulian extermination. That smoking charred leg bore witness to her ordeal in that cell. How she'd snapped at Ace not to show pity. What inner reserves did she possess, courtesy of the Rani's genetic tinkering?  
  
"Leaving parking orbit now. I'm going to take this puppy to the dark side."  
  
"Good job. Out of their radar, right?"  
  
"Right. Hold on."  
  
On the Karakulian flight deck, the artificial gravity functioned. Such a simple craft it was. For such a diabolical race. Ace tracked movement on the circular computer screen near Raina's left shoulder. A large green sphere traced itself. Small dashed lines grated out its coordinates. Around the sphere tracked a solid blue line. Their ship, Ace assumed. Small crosses must mean satellites. No other ship traces were visible. At least not now. Any minute Ace expected to see a new star join theirs. Her suspicion was well founded. There was a second trace. Following their path. "Hey Yank..."  
  
"I see them. Going to twenty thousand miles."  
  
Hands flew over control disks, like a train engineer turning tap valves. New coordinates traced out on another round screen to Raina's right. In Karakulianese symbols. And the distance between the traces was decreasing. Ace gripped the console nearest her.  
  
"come on..."  
  
"Any weapons on board this thing?"  
  
"Yeah! I'm onto it..." Ace shouted, dashing to the railing. Gripping it with both hands, she vaulted over. The sticky pads were marked, "Weapons section... battle stations"  
  
Ace had instinct for weapons. She'd seen the inside of the Karakulian ship on her last adventure with them. the controls here were much simpler. Two toggle knobs manipulated horizontal and vertical targeting. Firing was voice activated by a speaker.  
  
Raina coasted down to ten thousand miles. The second star arced around to follow. Ace struggled with the targeting. The ship kept drifting out of range. "  
  
"Damn!" she hissed. "This is worse than playing Pong."  
  
Ace remembered the ancient ancestor of video games, and realized it was Raina's contemporary game. A knob controlled a square blip. You could turn it up and down to go up and down. her cousin and she were rooting around in the attack. Inside a metal box they'd found the two paddles and program unit. Wiring it up to an old black and white set, they spent the afternoon playing. just on a whim. Her next shot just grazed them. "What the blazes are they doing."  
  
"Going to one hundred miles," said Raina.  
  
"That's in the upper atmosphere," said Ace.  
  
"I'm hoping it will interfere with their tracking."  
  
"It'd screw our ups as well."  
  
"Just point and shoot," said Raina. Already the ship shook. It was not designed for atmospheric lift. Grimly Raina hunched over her panels. How could she stay so calm? Ace wondered. That face set firmly. Brown eyes narrowed behind her glasses as all her mind focused  
  
Ace spun the two control like madness. Already she'd wasted most of the charges. "Hang on, Yank," she said. "Almost got them!"  
  
"They're right on top of us," said Raina. In her mind's eye she could see the wreath of clouds whizzing past the rectangular framework. They skimmed the upper atmosphere, drifting like a bizarre surfer on the spray zone of Karakul's atmosphere. The sauces wove after them, mimicking the bizarre dance. Lightening blasts crashed the clouds around them. They carried their storm with them. Box kite and saucer played tag. Unfortunately this game was deadly. If you got tagged, you weren't it, you were dead. Raina curved left, coming in over the lower troposphere.  
  
"Its getting hot in here," said Ace. Sweat dripped into her eyes. "I just can't get a good lock. Hold on, Yank... don't let them get us..."  
  
Raina dropped to fifty miles. Then up. The box kite Cerise drifted back up to one hundred miles. Two orbits had been tracked. Two orbits. What was it the Earth Astronauts warned about? "What are you doing?" Ace asked.  
  
"Hold on," said Raina. She shoved both knobs to the extreme right. The Frisbee followed the boxkite, guns glazing. Clouds revert off the sharp corners in crimson streamers. Stars peaked behind the vaporous trails. Raina decreased her approach vector. Lower and lower they plunged, till they were only fifty miles from Karakul's surface. Then the box kite bounced off the upper layers of the atmosphere. Nearly vertical, the ship was hurled back into space.  
  
Ace shouted, "Fire,"  
  
Molten drops cascaded from the frisbee. If someone had been watching, they'd notice the shooting star gracing Karakul's skies.  
  
***  
  
"Doctor! Will ye look at that?" Callom waved at something remote and distant.  
  
"Hmm, I never expected a meteor shower." The Doctor commented.  
  
With pure wonder Callom gaped at the streak of white fire. A huge rumbling boom rattled the windows of the City around them. Then as suddenly as it began, the streak split in two. A single fireball screamed into he distant mountains.  
  
Every thing flared fluorescent. The spherical blob expanded at light speed. All the details of the Doctor's coat sprang out. Blue and black tartan washed out pure white. Callom clasped hands over his eyes, it was so blinding. Seconds later the brilliance faded to tolerable darkness. Already the sun had set on Karakul, plunging the landscape into thick night. "Do ye suppose it was a shooting star?" the highlander asked.  
  
"More likely a ship." The Doctor shaded his eyes with his hand.  
  
"I hope it wasn't what I thought it was..."  
  
"Don't be ridiculous. Can't you still feel her?" the Doctor asked him.  
  
***  
  
Raina felt Ace helping her stand. "I don't know what you did, but it was incredible. I got them."  
  
"Bounced the ship of the atmosphere. The Karakulians thought we were going to land. I came in at an angle. So we just skipped off the atmosphere like a stone off water," laughed Raina. "Not bad for someone trapped before what is it. microchips."  
  
"Good going," laughed Ace. Raina grunted when she felt a huge impact on her back. Sweat pouring down her forehead, she grabbed Ace in a huge bear hug that lifted the teenager off her feet. "We did it!"  
  
"Now let's collect the professor and Callom," said Ace. "And get the hell outta here!"  
  
***  
  
Callom helped the Doctor struggle to his feet. As Raina did before, the Doctor leaned hard on the young highlander. Even thought the Doctor was short, he was heavy. Together they limped through the firestorm. Instinctively Callom knew the way. Across metal gleaming molten in the firelight, they stumbled. That same blackness curled before Callom' vision as before.  
  
"Come on, Doctor," said Callom. "Wake up, will ye?"  
  
"Just a bang on the head," muttered the Doctor. "I'll be alright."  
  
"What's that thing yer carrying?"  
  
"A remote control," the Doctor answered.  
  
"Those Karakulians will catch up to us if we don't get a move on..."  
  
Finally the Doctor caught his breath. They threw themselves down as a final explosion wracked the night. "What's going on?"  
  
"Ehrweylians," said the Doctor. And passed out.  
  
"Come on!" Callom cried, dragging him along. To get the TARDIS they had to return to the city. That thought made Callom since. Now that it was exploding in ruins. What were Ehrweylians doing back here all of a sudden, when they were supposed to have fled the planet?  
  
Again the blackness caught up with Callom, within his mind. Valiantly he dragged the Doctor. He dared not teleport, because the whole world was fire and dark. Like Armageddon. If these Ehrweylians were from Karakul, why were they hidden before? These thoughts on his mind, he felt his knees give way. He suddenly didn't have the strength to stand anymore. "So sorry Raina. I Cannae make it!"  
  
***  
  
Later, Callom felt hands lowering him to the ground. Was he having a nightmare? Based on his experience before? Raina had carried him days ago, or was it minutes? Out of the soil he raised his head. At least it was cool here. Ghosts rose all around them. He could hear their dry bones as they cracked. Someone had covered him with a cloak.. To the touch it felt like a slick shower curtain. Beside him, the doctor rubbed his head. He sat up, putting on his hat.  
  
"Callom, Lad. Are you all right?"  
  
"Och, I think so, doctor," he said. "Ma head fair near hurts. But it's no because I teleported."  
  
"We're home free. There's the TARDIS."  
  
"How what where?" asked Callom. Hitching his tartan toga round his waist, he stood up.  
  
"Easy now. Easy. That's it."  
  
They helped each other to the Police Box. Casually it stood near the trees, in a clearing. "Wait, almost forgot," said the Doctor. Reaching over, her picked up the strange bundle he'd been carrying. "Can't leave without this."  
  
"How did the TARDIS get here? And what are Ehrweylians doing back here popping oot of nowhere?"  
  
"One question at a time, lad," said the Doctor through the darkness. No light fell on them except he distant flickering of the city. Eerily it pixilated though the framework of dead trees.  
  
Drawing his key out of his pocket, the Doctor opened the doors. They entered the vast bright space of the console room. Callom saw the Doctor crouched under the console. The doors whirred shut. For a time he watched the city burning on the scanner. Those flames danced hypnotically. Meanwhile the Doctor wired the box somewhere under the TARDIS panels. Callom couldn't even begin to guess what it was for.  
  
"There were are," he laughed. "Good as new."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Dematerializing now. The Karakulian's little hyper drive unit's bypassed the TARDIS directional control."  
  
"Doctor, ye owe me an explanation. What happened to the city, and why is the TARDIS here instead of there?"  
  
"Simple. Someone moved it?"  
  
"Who?"  
  
"Some very old friends."  
  
"Not Karakulians, I take it."  
  
"No."  
  
"But if ye had friends on the planet before, why they pick nau of all times to show up?"  
  
"That's what I'm trying to figure out. They have a bad habit of running away when I ask."  
  
"Ehrweylians?"  
  
"Exactly."  
  
***  
  
Ace and Raina spun round as they heard the wheezing dematerialization. The TARDIS solidified, and the light stopped flashing. They rushed over as the males emerged. "We saw the explosions coming from the dark side," said Ace. "What happened?"  
  
"The Ehrweylians happened," said the Doctor simply. "Ready to go?"  
  
"We're leaving just like that?" asked Raina. "Wait about the colonists?"  
  
"The Rani's revenge has again backfired. And the Erweylians are free to return."  
  
"Just like that. why didn't they come before?" asked Raina.  
  
"Because. of the threat of their power." the Doctor said. "But I highly doubt that the transwarp barriers will keep them out as they had before." The Doctor clutched his box. Then set it on the floor before one of the panels. "Maneuver the ship into a high orbit, Raina."  
  
Shaking her head, Raina eased the dual controls for plotting the orbit. The third control she turned to half thrust. Rockets boomed as the hybrid ship coasted to a higher orbit within minutes. Callom stood next to Ace. They exchanged smiles. Ace masked her concern as she glanced into his face. How drawn and pale he looked lately. All they could do now was watch the Time Lord messing with a small box of circuits while Raina piloted the craft. He muttered to himself and grumbled, sometimes rapping the box angrily.  
  
"What are you grousing about now?" asked Ace.  
  
"You'll find out. How much farther to go, Raina?"  
  
"About five miles. Then we will be in position for a hyperjump. But there's a problem. I think the directional control is shot."  
  
"No worries. Just get us out of a low orbit."  
  
"There might not be enough fuel to reach escape velocity. I've barely got enough left for maneuvering," Raina announced grimly.  
  
"We had a battle with a Karakulian saucer," Ace explained.  
  
"That was the shooting start, then" asked Callom. Ace nodded. Both teenagers leaned against a nearby wall panel. Karakulians unfortunately didn't' need to sit when flying their craft. The Doctor flipped switches on his box. "Ready?"  
  
"We've run out of fuel. But we're there," said Raina triumphantly.  
  
"Good girl. Now hold on. Here goes nothing. Operate the hyperjump."  
  
Raina pushed an improvised solenoid. At first nothing happened. Then she kicked the panel. Nuclear engines hummed into life, from a distance. Everyone felt the sudden shock as the Cerise crept to transwarp velocity. "We're reaching light speed now..." The Doctor nodded eagerly.  
  
Callom crossed his fingers. Would it work? Monitors tracing their orbits went blank. "It's okay," said Ace, fingers slipping around his hand. "We're outta here!"  
  
Gently he squeezed her hand in return. Neither teen let go.  
  
It started from the roots of the floor. Everything shook. Even the view itself. The whole room shuddered. Callom felt his heart pounding in his chest as he was pressed flat against the wall. "We've breached the fourth dimension... entering hyper space now!" came Raina's voice, slightly distorted.  
  
"This did nae happen before," said Callom, worried.  
  
"Professor?" asked Ace.  
  
The only answer to her query was glance from the floor. Frantically the Doctor pressed solenoids on the box. "What the hell are you playing at?" She cried.  
  
Straining struts groaned. "It's what I was afraid of!" cried Raina. The walls around them began to buckle. "This Karakulian ship isn't built to withstand the strain of hyper space!"  
  
"Quickly! To the TARDIS!" shouted the Doctor, grabbing his umbrella. Ace dashed over, still clutching Callom's hand. They slipped inside.  
  
"Come on Yank!" she shouted. "Don't hang about!"  
  
There was a bang. Everyone pitched sideways.  
  
"The struts have torn!" shouted Raina. Still she stood by the control panels. "We're detaching from the Cerise!!"  
  
"One more second," muttered the Doctor. He reached for the box. Hit one last solenoid with the toe of his foot.  
  
Ace rushed to Raina, grabbing her arm. "Come on already! There's nothing we can do! We gotta split!"  
  
"But the ship... without the directional control will keep on drifting!" Raina cried.  
  
"Don't worry about that!" said the Doctor. "I've got it set!"  
  
He stopped when a collapsing girder smacked him on the head. All around them the panels sparked. Pieces dropped from the ceiling and walls. Grabbing the Doctor's shoulders, Raina and Ace wrested him towards the TARDIS. Callom and Ace took the Doctor as Raina pulled the key from his pocket.  
  
***  
  
Ace shut the doors. Swooning against Callom, the Doctor muttered gibberish. "He's been acting like that for the past few minutes," said Callom.  
  
"Oh great," Ace complained. "What are we going to do now? If we get caught in the back lash..."  
  
"We can nae fly this without him awake..."  
  
Raina hastily consulted the fault locator. "Everything's repaired," she said.  
  
"Ummm...."  
  
"Doctor!" cried Callom. "What do we do!"  
  
"Raina," he muttered. "You. posses the know-how. Vitreum's last gift to you."  
  
"He's saying yer name," said Ace.  
  
"Yes Ace, I can hear...." snapped Raina impatiently.  
  
Through half open eyes he glanced at the Geologist. "You... must take off."  
  
"But I'm not a time lord..."  
  
"You contain the genetic inheritance..." he gasped. "Symbiotic nuclei.. To stabilize... it was Vitreum's last gift. And besides. Tegan could well fly this rackety old bucket, although I'd never admit to her that she could."  
  
"Tegan?" asked Raina.  
  
"One of his friends," said Ace quickly.  
  
"Me fly the TARDIS," she gasped, rushing over to the console. Desperately her hands flew over the panels. Callom and Ace watched feverishly as they felt the ship lurching. Stiffly she hesitated before each action. Then a veil of calmness fell over her.  
  
"Callom, sense my thoughts," the Doctor whispered, and slowly reached out to touch Callom's temples. "Relay them to Raina. she will know."  
  
Raina gasped as she felt strange equations flowing through her mind. Using Callom as a conduit, through the rapport he shared with the human woman, altered by the Rani's genetics, the Doctor relayed what she would know. He used her instead of Ace, not wanting to subject her to the rigors of such a mind link. for in some dark corner of his mind he was trying to protect her, maintain her innocence. He relayed this revelation to Raina, and she slowly let him inside her mind, realizing his trust in her was absolute.  
  
"Setting vortex coordinates," said she. At last she grasped the three demat levers in both hands. Edging them forwards, she said, "here goes nothing."  
  
They sighed with relief as the column rose and fell. Wheezing shudders permeated the room. Raina still hunched over the console, staring at he bobbing column overtop her glasses.  
  
"I knew ye could do it," said Callom. Reaching behind her, he wrapped her in a hug. Her shoulders were rock hard with tension. Slowly the Doctor stumbled over to Raina, and slowly put his hand to her temples.  
  
"Why me?" she asked. "Why not Ace?"  
  
"Because, there are reasons. You must let me complete the link. trust me."  
  
"but I'm not telepathic."  
  
"Rubbish," he whispered. "The Rani gave you something that I thought she would not dare. And Vitreum's inheritance was not wasted. Reach into yourself and let me in. let me show you how it is done. for I fear. I wont' last long."  
  
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," she said, taking his hand in hers. "I'm afraid I don't know where we'll end up."  
  
"Just as long as we got out there," said Ace. "After all, you flew that other ship.."  
  
"A Karakulian ship is hardly a TARDIS," she said.  
  
"No. I meant yer own time machine."  
  
Curving around to the next panel she checked the readouts. "It's like trying to drive a stick shift when you're used to an automatic," she explained. "It's a type 40, no matter what you see."  
  
"Yes," the Doctor panted, pressing his hands to her head and slowly trying to make her focus. He felt black miasma spinning before him as he attempted to force as much in before collapsing. Callom and Ace looked at him as they grabbed him.  
  
"doctor." Raina gasped.  
  
"Remember. Tegan," he whispered. "You're the coordinator. Adric. you are what keeps us together. Nyssa. you are the strength. and your chemistry know-how."  
  
"What are you babbling about?" Raina asked.  
  
"He's delirious, he's calling us by other names."  
  
"Tegan. I trust you." the Doctor moaned as Ace helped him to sit in a chair.  
  
"Can ye fly it?" asked Callom, as Raina bit her nails.  
  
"The principle's the same. But it's an antique," she said, scratching her head. "So primitive compared to the Rani's. Cumbersome. But I'll do what I can. We're in the Vortex with the last coordinates I punched. But to fix an actual destination... may take some time to figure out..."  
  
"Stay up here," said Ace. "Just get us away from Karakul past or present."  
  
Both Callom and she supported the unconscious Doctor. Newfound confidence passed from the two teens to her. Between them they carried him through the door. "We'll get him to bed," said Ace.  
  
"I hope I can land us somewhere we can get him help," said Raina as she watched them leave.  
  
**  
  
Multiple figures in environmental suits trotted against the Armageddon they'd created. "As before we resort to war," grumbled Zaylexa.  
  
"It is necessary, my love," sighed Tahmer. "It is what they deserve."  
  
The giants caught the arm of one soldier as he rushed past. "Miarah. Did you spot any other aliens?"  
  
"Just two sir. Heading toward the city."  
  
"Strangers?"  
  
"Come. WE have work to do," said her consort.  
  
Slender figures trotted instinctively toward the firestorm. Cries rattled against the gunfire and explosives. The Ehrweylians took back their City, Zaylexa thought. At last the madness could end. The one known as the Rani had ruled them for far too long thorough terror. They had escaped her clutches to hide, and await the Doctor, who would set them free.  
  
"Here they are," said Tahmer. At their feet two figures lay semiconscious. "Help me get them to the clearing."  
  
Boosting them on their shoulders, the figures trotted through the forest. Once they reached the clearing, Tahmer lowered his body to the ground. Zaylexa did the same. Both dropped to their knees with reverence. They touched faces to the charred soil, then bent backwards as if to kiss the sky. "Again he has come, out of the fabric of reality itself in our time of need," Zaylexa chanted.  
  
Spanning his arms a fathom, her consort stood up. Frightened blue eyes took in the blue box. He dared not approach till the proper incantation was said. "My blessed ancestor long ago wrote of your return. He set the skies the signs we must follow. This Traveler has answered our pleas. We held back till the skies wept the shooting stars. Then we fell upon the City."  
  
"And now we have returned to the Landing place," said Zaylexa.  
  
Carefully they arranged the bodies in a spread eagle fashion. Then removing their cloaks they covered them. "Take these meager signs of our hospitality. WE defer to your wisdom with reverence. A new day dawns as we pick ourselves from the ashes."  
  
"The Circle of friends has closed..."  
  
Both stood side by side. Zaylexa's golden head came just to Tahmer's nose. "As your father and father's father before you, you lead us well," she said. "Now, take my hand as our Ancestors did..."  
  
Grasping hands, they stood before the Box. All the mysteries it must hold. Well Tahmer recalled the morning's work digging it out. Six strong Ehrweylians had dragged it to the right place, setting it here.  
  
Carefully they'd kept their distance in the woods, scaring off the animals that would attack the others. Two men and two women had returned, as the Doctor had so long ago. Their faces were different, but that mattered not. All the signs were there. Then the stars fell, two of them. That was the signal to attack the City. The Karakulians had cast on a slumber and it was easy to slip inside of the City then. Once positioned, the troops set bombs to the defense screens. From there on it was simplicity.  
  
Tahmer and Zaylexa clasped hands, and faced the Box again. Then they turned to leave the Circle of Friends. "Farewell, Traveler, and Doctor. You are the brave ones. For your names are spoken. Doctor, Tegan, Nyssa and Adric. You are remembered."  
  
A new sun would rise over a new Karakul, and the new chapter of Ehrweyl civilization. Tahmer would rule as his grandfather had. And his forbear had so long ago.  
  
"Why did they have to suffer so?" asked Zaylexa. When they had left the circle of friends.  
  
"They suffered before," said Tahmer. "Willingly-it was written-must they involve themselves before we emerge. To show us the signs. Only then could we shed our mantle of non aggression to attack."  
  
"But we trained our soldiers to fight."  
  
"Fighting is not the same as training," said Tahmer. "We did not kill when we trained. Now we kill."  
  
"Will we also fly in space again?" she asked.  
  
"Someday Zaylexa my love," he said, turning her to face him. "But we must take our steps slowly. We have only just won back the City."  
  
Zaylexa felt his lips touch her forehead. Glancing up into the stars above, she could swear that she saw one winking at her.  
  
*** 


End file.
